Resources category: Global

The Union partnered with experts to highlight experiences using best practices for effective enforcement and implementation of tobacco control laws. View the webinar presentations to hear lessons learned from real-world case studies.  

The Union’s Tobacco Control Department produced a new factsheet on Implementation and Enforcement and offers a deep dive into the topic, summarizing evidence, defining key terms, and providing practical guidance and evidence-based recommendations.

The Union partnered with experts to highlight real world case studies on using innovative technology to support public monitoring of tobacco control laws. View the webinar presentations to learn about best practices and how these tools can improve implementation.  

A toolkit to provide a roadmap for establishing multisectoral strategies, plans and programmes for tobacco control in line with WHO FCTC Article 5.1.

The eighth WHO report on the global tobacco epidemic tracks the progress made by countries in tobacco control since 2008 including data on electronic nicotine delivery systems, such as ‘e-cigarettes’.

Advanced practices and lessons learned from Parties in the implementation of Article 13, with a focus on combatting cross-border advertising and the depiction of tobacco in entertainment media.

The Union is partnered with experts to highlight real world case studies on how the tobacco industry undermines tobacco control policy implementation and enforcement, with a focus on the retail environment. View the webinar presentations and learn about the strategies adopted to limit the impact of these tactics on the implementation of tobacco control policies. 

The Global Health Advocacy Incubator by Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids provides strategic support to advocates planning and executing high impact campaigns to enact and implement laws that save lives.

This course offers free instructional training to people interested in learning more about tobacco control.

Media Beacon is an online resource from Vital Strategies of tested and proven, best practice media campaign materials designed to support tobacco control health objectives.

This study aims to describe and compare global trends in legislation and compliance of smokefree and TAPS policies between 2009 and 2019.

Country-level compliance data that accompanies the WHO's annual report on the Global Tobacco Epidemic.

This site is dedicated to countering tobacco at the point-of-sale and offers evidence-based descriptions of the problem, policy solutions, advocacy materials and news updates.

The new tobacco laboratory guide is a useful resource for countries, and provides regulators and policymakers with comprehensible information on how to test tobacco products, what products to test, and how to use testing data in a meaningful way to support regulation.

The “Tobacco product regulation: basic handbook” provides a basic reference document for non-scientist regulators in any country and serves as a tool for health authorities and other interested parties seeking resources and planning on how to monitor, evaluate, and regulate tobacco products. Further, the handbook includes relevant country case studies detailing specific approaches enacted globally.

This set of case study, focusing specifically on regulations of menthol in tobacco products, provide practical guidance to countries by describing effective regulatory strategies in tobacco product regulation, including lessons learned and challenges encountered in developing and implementing menthol related regulation.

The World Health Organizations Tobacco Free Initiative (TFI) list of key elements of legislation for tobacco control.

Search and download factsheets and summaries of tobacco control legislation and regulations from around the world. Search by country, region, keyword, tobacco control measure, or type of legal action.

This report uses publicly available information on tobacco industry interference in 34 countries and their respective governments’ responses to these interferences to interpret key findings and rank the countries on several interference indicators.

This report, WHO’s seventh in the series, provides a country-level examination of the global tobacco epidemic and identifies countries that have applied selected measures for reducing tobacco use. This report focuses on supporting tobacco users to increase cessation success. 

The sixth edition of Tobacco atlas and its companion website provide comprehensive guidance on tobacco control issues and tools used to counter them. Use the Tobacco Atlas to explore key issues and solutions and the companion website to search for country specific information.

This online tool was developed by WHO to support stakeholder mapping in Family Planning but can be adapted for use in tobacco control.

This Guide provides steps and sample materials to assess compliance with health warning labels, 

A “How-to” Guide for Observing the Internet, Sponsored Events, and Corporate Social Responsibility.

"Countering Tobacco Tactics" is a guide to help policymakers and tobacco control advocates identify, monitor, expose, challenge, and counter tobacco industry tactics in order to prevent industry interference in public health and health policy.

The Union’s FCTC Article 5.3 Toolkit provides step-by-step guidance for governments on preventing tobacco industry interference and protecting tobacco control laws and policies.

This guide promotes best practice for conducting studies of compliance with smoke-free laws, including the rationale for doing or not doing a study, the knowledge and resources needed, and how to design the study and effectively disseminate the results. Available in English and Spanish.

This guide examines specific barriers to the enforcement of smokefree laws and regulations and offers proven advocacy strategies for overcoming these barriers.

Collection of example flyers and leaflets from tobacco control initiatives around the globe for different venues types, including restaurants, sports clubs, government buildings, tobacco retailers and more. 

This report analyzes how economic fear influences policymakers when contemplating tobacco control efforts. It also demonstrates the economic benefits of tobacco control policies and the responsibility of governments to reduce potential costs of tobacco control efforts.

This WHO FCTC glossary defines terms used in the FCTC and its instruments. It can be used for educational purposes and to aid a better understanding of the FCTC.

The 2018 global progress report on the implementation of WHO FCTC. 

This study aims to determine the number of smoking-attributable deaths were averted due to the implementation of MPOWER policies. 

Comprehensive literature review to provide evidence for effective enforcement strategies and suggest measures to improve policy compliance. 

This study aims to evaluated the global progress of the six MPOWER measures and their impact across 88 countries that have adopted one or more measure from 2007 to 2014.

This paper proposes a general working taxonomic of eight implementation elements to measure implementation outcomes, advance implementation processes, and improve effectiveness of implementation strategies.

This report reviews the global evidence on the impact of the WHO FCTC implementation of tobacco control legislation. 

This study evaluates the effect of point-of-sale display bans globally as of 2016.

This WHO publication offers practical guidance to assist staff and city officials prepare for and implement smokefree legislation. 

A review and research agenda on the challenges of implementing smokefree policies in low- and middle-income countries, identifying five areas where progress is urgently needed.

This publication contains the guidelines adopted by the Conference of the Parties (COP) to the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (WHO FCTC) at its second (2007), third (2008), fourth (2010) and fifth (2012) sessions. 

This booklet provides an overview of key smokefree enforcement issues and sources of more information- because the authors live in Bangladesh this booklet draws heavily on examples from that country, but most of the issues are universal and approaches should easily be adaptable.

This report, WHO’s fourth in the series, provides a country-level examination of the global tobacco epidemic and identifies countries that have applied selected measures for reducing tobacco use. This report focuses on Enforcing bans on tobacco advertising, promotion and sponsorship.

Set of tools for program sustainability including a self assessment guide and a program framework guide. 

A tool to measure the sustainability of national tobacco control programmes. Includes a report of tobacco control sustainability assessments from 24 countries with the world’s highest tobacco burden.

This toolkit from the Global Smokefree Partnership draws on the experience of jurisdictions that have successfully implemented strong smokefree laws, and captures some of the important lessons common to these efforts.

Examples of smokefree protocols to support the implementation of smokefree policies.

This document aims to provide background and contextual information on tobacco industry interference practices and how Contracting Parties to the WHO FCTC can monitor industry interference efforts and better implement FCTC Article 5.3 guidelines.

Tobacco industry interference remains the most significant barrier to the global implementation of Article 5.3 of the WHO FCTC. This guide aims to assist parties in their efforts to implement and protect tobacco control efforts from tobacco industry interference. 

This article reviews published research on tobacco industry activities that interfere with tobacco control policies and encourage tobacco use in LMICs to more thoroughly understand industry practices and strategies in LMICs.

The University of California San Francisco database contains over 14 million archived documents on tobacco industry activities, including advertising, manufacturing, marketing, scientific research, and political activities. In particular, the database provides access to internal industry documents made public during United States v. Philip Morris USA Inc., et al. and other litigation cases.

Tobacco Tactics investigates tobacco industry strategies and tactics for undermining tobacco control efforts and provides rigorously researched reports, profiles, and information on industry players, allies, and activities. 

Stopping Tobacco Organizations and Products (STOP) works to understand and expose the tobacco industry’s efforts to derail tobacco control and hook a new generation of users. STOP's Resources Archive arms and supports stakeholders with tools and resources to counter the industry, including the latest analyses, reports, and information on the industry’s tactics. 

This article outlines a model that provides an evidence-based summary of corporate political strategies used by the tobacco industry. The model enables public health practitioners to anticipate these strategies and develop realistic assessments of the industry’s claims.

This report uses publicly available information on tobacco industry interference in 33 countries and their respective governments’ responses to these interferences to interpret key findings and rank the countries on several interference indicators.

This article explores the tobacco industry's practices in low and middle-income countries (LMICs), given the industry's growing interest, investment, and interference in these regions. It focuses on how exposing the industry's misconduct is necessary for both the implementation of the WHO FCTC and more 'endgame' solutions to the tobacco epidemic.

The Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids Industry Watch project seeks to hold the tobacco industry accountable by providing facts about how tobacco companies operate and working to expose and stop the industry’s harmful activities. The Industry Watch website contains helpful resources, including factsheets, industry profiles, reports and studies, presentations, press releases, and key websites.

The Crooked Nine report outlines the tobacco industry's strategies, techniques, and tactics to undermine tobacco control using case studies from around the world. It is designed to help the tobacco control community predict the industry's actions and counter industry interference. 

The African Tobacco Control Alliance (ATCA) is a Pan-African network of more than 120 civil society organizations that monitors and responds to industry interference and provides regional resources. This page provides case studies of African countries and organizations responding to tobacco industry interference.

This article is a case study ion Philip Morris' involvement in the cessation arena and an evaluation of how and why PM supports cessation programs. It illustrates a notable example of industry interference that undermines effective tobacco control.

This is a set of smokefree hospital strategic guides to equip those implementing smokefree policies with the tools for effective implementation and enforcement.