Federal Tobacco Control Strategy
The primary mission of the Federal Tobacco Control Strategy (FTCS) is to reduce tobacco-related disease and death among Canadians. The FTCS has five 10-year (2001-2011) objectives:
- reduce the number of people who smoke from 25% to 20% of the population;
- decrease the number of cigarettes sold by 30%;
- increase retailer compliance with laws on tobacco sales to youth from 69% to 80%;
- reduce the number of people involuntarily exposed to environmental tobacco smoke in enclosed public spaces;
- explore ways to mandate changes to tobacco products to reduce hazards to health.
It’s recognized worldwide that comprehensive, integrated and sustained actions are key to successful tobacco control strategies. The FTCS was designed incorporating these principles. This Strategy is carried out in close collaboration with all partners, and is directed at Canadians of all ages, with a particular emphasis on high risk groups ranging from youth (whose smoking prevalence is 25%), to young adults (32%), to recent immigrants to Canada, to Inuit (72%) and to First Nations (62%) and other Aboriginal groups.
Four mutually reinforcing components have been identified to support achievement of the Strategy’s objectives: protection, prevention, cessation, and harm reduction/product modification. Protection creates an environment (physical, legal and regulatory) that supports non-smoking as the norm in Canada. Prevention discourages people, especially youth, from taking up smoking. Cessation helps people quit smoking. Harm reduction recognizes that some smokers will continue to smoke despite our best efforts to encourage quitting, and aims at reducing the health hazards of tobacco products to the greatest extent possible.
View the complete Federal Tobacco Control Strategy.
As the annual progress report for Canada's national tobacco control strategy, Moving Forward has for the past five years presented a yearly snapshot of provincial, territorial, and federal efforts to reduce tobacco use. Consult the 2005 Progress Report on Tobacco Control.
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