CHINA'S tobacco industry has invested between 50 billion and 65 billion yuan (US$6 billion and US$9 billion) in helping farmers over 21 years from 1985 to 2006, according to the State Tobacco Monopoly Administration, but health experts argue the figure is far from sufficient.
Since 1985, the tobacco industry has invested between two billion and seven billion yuan annually in agriculture to help lift farmers out of poverty, a STMA report claimed.
The report pointed to the 2.67 billion yuan channeled by the Yunnan Provincial Tobacco Monopoly Bureau into local irrigation systems to help tobacco farmers.
It also cited Xu Xueliang, a tobacco farmer in Luliang County, more than 100 kilometers east of Yunnan's capital Kunming, as saying, "In the past, we had to fetch water from a place five km away using an ox and cart. It's much more convenient now as we can get water from the tap right in the middle of the farmland."
The report did not impress health professionals such as Zhi Xiuyi, director of the Tobacco Control and Lung Cancer Department in the Cancer Foundation of China.
"The STMA stated this year that the daily tax revenue of the tobacco industry was nearly 800 million yuan, excluding imported cigarettes. Thus the investment is only a small part of the huge profits made by the tobacco industry. The STMA should not be proud of it," Zhi said.
"The government should invest more money accrued from the tobacco tax in the public health system and medical research," he added.