The Third World dilemma is that tobacco is an important cash crop, the cigarette industry is expanding but so is the rate of lung cancer. Smoking is steadily increasing in developing countries. Some cigarettes sold to countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America deliver twice as much cancer-causing tar as the same brands sold in the countries manufacturing them. Frequently images of sex, success, luxury and white European sophistication are used to sell cigarettes in the Third World.
China produces more cigarettes than any other country.
By the year 2025 over 2 million Chinese will die prematurely each year because of smoking. The Western Pacific Region contains one third of the world's population and more than 200 million of them smoke. The rapid increase in tobacco consumption in the Western Pacific region accompanied the arrival of greatly increased advertising directed mainly at young people and women. In Kenya the British American Tobacco Company for many years had no competition but was still the 4th largest advertiser - spending nearly as much as Coca Cola at the height of its war against other cool drink companies. Tobacco companies pay cash on delivery for a tobacco crop which provides farmers with an incentive to grow tobacco.