The government needs to increase taxes on tobacco in an effort to curb the prevalence of smoking-related diseases.

The remarks were made during the opening of a two-day high level continental meeting on tobacco taxation in Kigali, yesterday.

Tobacco is one of the most common risk factors for non-communicable diseases (NCD’s) such as heart disease, stroke, chronic lung disease, type 2 diabetes and many types of cancers.

"Higher taxes lead to high purchase prices for tobacco products, discouraging consumption, which in the process reduces health risk, yet maximising tax revenue for a country,” said Francis

Thompson, the director of the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC), an NGO partnering with the World Health Organisation(WHO).

WHO recommends that member countries increase excise tax charged on cigarettes to at least 70 per cent of the retail price of a packet.

According to Dr Theophile Dushime, the director-general of clinical services at the Ministry of Health, since 2005, routine sensitisation programmes targeting the youth in schools, women, and the army , have been conducted as a tobacco control measure.

Rwanda ratified the World Health Organisation Framework Convention on Tobacco control in 2005, and enacted a Control Bill in 2013. As a result tobacco, advertisement, promotion and sponsorship were banned.

Over a year ago, a law banning public smoking was passed, among other things requiring public places to designate a smoking area, with clear notices displayed in Kinyarwanda, English and French.

According to WHO figures, Rwanda has the highest excise tax on cigarettes in the region, comprising 50 per cent of the total retail price of a packet, followed by Burundi (39 per cent), Kenya (35 per cent), Uganda (25 per cent) and Tanzania (11 per cent).

When considering the total tax share (excise tax and other charges) of the retail price per packet on selected popular brands, Rwanda’s figure rises to about 58 per cent, followed by Burundi (52 per cent), Kenya (49 per cent), and Uganda (40 per cent).

The average price per pack of cigarettes in Rwanda is $0.80 (about Rwf558), which is below the global average price of $2.41 .

According to Dr Nigar Nargis, the in-charge of tobacco taxation at WHO headquarters in Geneva, the African continent incurs about $21.4 billion in health costs related to tobbacco use annually and $10.7bn in terms of tobbacco purchases.

The global tobacco epidemic kills nearly six million people each year, of which more than 600 000 are non-smokers dying from breathing second-hand smoke.

Unless action is taken, the epidemic will kill more than 8 million people every year by 2030. And more than 80 per cent of these preventable deaths will be among people living in low-and middle-income countries.

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