Case Study: The World Trade Organization and China

Tobacco was at the heart of negotiations over China's entry into the WTO - with China agreeing to reduce its tariff on American tobacco and end its ban on American tobacco leaf.

With more smokers than China than people in the US, tobacco companies were anxious to mine these new customers:

"The Chinese cigarette market is already three times the size of the US market, and accounts for over 30 percent of the world's 5.4 trillion units. Since the total international segment amounts to less than 1 percent of this huge market, we have plenty of room for dramatic growth." (Philip Morris, 1993)

Internal Phillip Morris documents from the 1990s revealed their overwhelming support for international trade treaties like NAFT and their desire to use those to remove previous tobacco trade restrictions. Many of these secret documents also show the US government's complicit role in allowing US tobacco companies to move overseas and aggressively market a product that kills half of all its users.