HEALTH

The Tobacco Control Data Initiative

Strengthening public health policy through data systems and digital infrastructure.

Why Tobacco Control Data Matters for Public Health

Tobacco use continues to harm individuals and communities. It is estimated that more than seven million people will die each year from direct tobacco use and another 1.2 million non-smokers will die due to exposure to secondhand smoke.

Despite public awareness efforts and the adoption of the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control by more than 179 countries, tobacco usage is on the rise in low- and middle-income countries, including within southern, western, and eastern Africa. Unless serious tobacco control initiatives are passed and successfully implemented, tobacco use could double on the African continent within a decade.

For a long time, governments lacked access to a single, comprehensive source of tobacco data to inform policy decisions, underscoring the need for a more coordinated approach to tobacco data.

About the Tobacco Control Data Initiative

The Tobacco Control Data Initiative (TCDI) was launched in 2019 with the aim of supplying governments, civil society, and academia with improved access to country-specific data that will inform better tobacco control policy design and implementation. It is implemented by Development Gateway, in partnership with the University of Cape Town’s Research Unit on the Economics of Excisable Products and funded by a grant from the Gates Foundation.

TCDI addresses barriers to data use in tobacco control by consolidating available and trusted tobacco control data, identifying and filling data gaps, and creating an online resource for comprehensive tobacco-related data and information.

After initial desk research, TCDI completed country assessments in our target countries, interviewing more than 100 stakeholders on tobacco use and control data needs. With TCDI, DG developed six country-specific websites that present and visualize tobacco research, built in close collaboration with government ministries such as health, finance, and trade, as well as civil society organizations, academics, and local research firms.

Getting Timely, Relevant, and Trusted Data to Policymakers

TCDI helps strengthen policymaking by providing credible data to inform tax reforms, support legislative proposals, respond to tobacco industry interference, and inform smoke-free measures. Part of this work has been to localize multi-country research programs like TCDI, balancing a consistent research structure with meaningful country-level customization. This contextualized structure ensures that results are useful and applicable across different settings.

Sustainability

In November 2023, the program received additional funding for an additional four years to implement the second phase: TCDI 2.0. With DG’s support, the Center for the Study of the Economies of Africa (CSEA) now runs the front end of the TCDI six-country evidence dashboard, the first African-led, multi-country data source of its kind in the tobacco control space. This marks the culmination of TCDI’s second phase, in which DG handed over day-to-day management of the six country-specific websites to CSEA while continuing to administer the dashboards’ back end, an arrangement designed to keep the sites updated, keep government officials engaged as key policymaking users, and ensure continuity through at least November 2027.

impact

The TCDI websites for DRC, Kenya, Ethiopia, Nigeria, South Africa, and Zambia were publicly launched in 2023. TCDI has also conducted additional primary research to fill data gaps identified early in the process, including research on shisha in Nigeria and e-cigarette research in South Africa. Before TCDI, Tobacco control data were siloed with a fragmented dataset held by the Ministry of Health (MoH), state departments, NGOs, and WHO surveys. After TCDI’s launch, the Ministries have institutionalized tobacco control data access through the TCDI dashboard within the MoH and state systems, replacing ad hoc data requests with real-time evidence. More so, TCDI has led to high-level fiscal reforms as well as inter-ministerial coordination across Ethiopia, Nigeria, the DRC, and Zambia through its single platform linking tobacco control data relevant to health, finance, and customs officials.

Nigeria, the DRC, and Zambia through its single platform linking tobacco control data relevant to health, finance, and customs
officials.

In Ethiopia, the TCDI dashboard informed the fiscal policy reform in the 2023/2024 tax increase. The 2024 changes significantly increased the specific excise tax on cigarettes from 8 Birr to 20 Birr per pack of 20 sticks (while retaining the 30% ad valorem). These revisions marked the Ethiopian government’s continued efforts to align excise taxation with public health objectives and international best practices.
In Zambia, TCDI helped civil society organizations such as the Zambia Consumers Association (ZACA), to support policy formulation and advocacy on advertising bans and clearer labeling. Recognizing the dashboard’s value, the Zambian Parliamentary Committee on Health, Community Development and Social Services invited DG to make a submission on the implications of the Tobacco Control Bill, a clear sign of how evidence produced outside government can inform decisions made within it.
In Nigeria, CSOs are shifting focus to tobacco control advocacy based on available TCDI data. In 2023, after the CSO KAHADI Development Initiative participated in a joint tobacco control workshop organized by TCDI’s sustainability partner, CSEA, it launched its tobacco control advocacy efforts. Since then, TCDI data has played a central role in driving both grassroots rehabilitation and high-level policy change within the organization.