Dear President,
The Convention Secretariat is pleased with the opportunity to address Committee A. As you may know, the Convention Secretariat is a permanent body hosted by WHO to support Parties in their implementation of the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control.
Following the inclusion of a tobacco-control target 3.a among the Sustainable Development Goals - requiring Parties to strengthen implementation of the Convention - the Convention Secretariat is committed to coordinate and lead the global response to achieve this goal, under the guidance of our governing body, the Conference of the Parties. As part of this work, we recently made contributions to the 2016 ECOSOC High-level Political Forum on Sustainable Development.
Meanwhile, we are also heavily engaged in the fight against noncommunicable diseases. Following a historic decision at the sixth session of the COP in 2014, it was decided that COP would strengthen its contribution towards the NCD global target for the reduction of tobacco use. It must be noted that although 35 countries are on track to attain the 30% relative reduction target in the prevalence of current tobacco use by 2025, most countries will not reach it unless they fully engage in implementing the treaty provisions.
The Convention Secretariat is a member of the UN Interagency Task Force leading the agenda items on the Convention implementation and has recently joined the Global Coordination Mechanism on the Prevention and Control of NCDs.
Our 11 years of experience in implementing the Convention has also proved useful in tackling other common risk factors. I would ask the WHO Secretariat to include relevant COP decisions in its report regarding the High-level meeting in 2018, as outlined in Annex 7.
Finally, I would like to urge States Non-Parties to become Parties to the treaty, so that we leave no Member State behind. I would also ask Parties to the Convention who have not yet ratified the Protocol to Eliminate Illicit Trade in Tobacco Products, to do so as soon as possible, so that we can have the extra 23 Parties we need for its entry into force.
I thank you for your kind attention.