ASH’s Tobacco Industry Monitoring (TIM) program works to track and publicize tobacco industry behavior. Our TIM program stems from Article 5.3 of the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC), which obligates national governments to prevent the tobacco industry from interfering in tobacco regulation.
The more light we can shine on big tobacco’s efforts to stop meaningful tobacco control, the less effective their efforts will be.
ASH is hard at work gathering data on where the industry makes its money, how it is spent, and the economic devastation left behind. Some highlights of our work in 2015 are:
– We published case studies that illustrate international lessons learned on smoke-free air laws in several countries (France, Uruguay, and Switzerland). These case studies are in support of our FCTC Implementation Guide. 
– One of TIM’s biggest projects for the year was updating our campaign contributions map. Big Tobacco contributed almost $2 million to politicians in the 2014 elections, and our map shows how pervasive tobacco money is in politics. Check to see if your candidate took tobacco money in the last election, and look for the next iteration of our map, coming in 2016!
– ASH worked with our partners to expose the U.S. Chamber of Commerce as a front group for Big Tobacco. Our work included a protest outside of the Chamber, where we showed up with Jeff the Diseased Lung!
– In response to PMI’s Marlboro campaign entitled “Don’t Be a Maybe”, we created similar “Don’t Be A Target” graphics and encouraged people to watch our video called “Don’t Be a Target”. We also participated in a flash mob outside of the Philip Morris shareholders meeting in order to draw attention to PMI’s marketing strategies.
– We also followed and shared news about tobacco control, the tobacco industry, and how they interfere in tobacco regulation, both in the United States and around the world. Read some of these articles here, here and here.
Check back next month to see the exciting things we have planned for the TIM Project in 2016!
