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Case 4-6: Making Socially Responsible and Ethical Marketing Decisions

Ganesh K.C

Bn181489

Westcliff University/ Kings College

BUS 367 Necessities of International Marketing and Culture

Professor Pandey

April 19, 2022

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Tobacco and the Third World Countries

As we all know and have been hearing about tobacco, it is one of the most harmful thing

that a human can consume and yet many people around the world consume it despite its

consequences and negative effects. Tobacco contains nicotine, a kind of ingredient that can lead

to addiction and people can never get enough of it, once people are addicted to it. Tobaccos are

usually smoked, chewed or sniffed by people in order to satisfy their addiction and desperation.

From the record of WHO, a new report on global tobacco use trends suggests that around 1.337

billion people use tobacco out of total population in the world (WHO, 2019). As per the study

suggests, the country where there are huge numbers of tobacco users is China. China has the

most tobacco users i.e. 300.8 million, which is followed by India, i.e. 274.9 million population

(Myers, 2012). After these two nations, other nations that have the highest percentage of tobacco

users are generally European and American nations. Tobaccos are the most unitary product that

are sold all over the world and according to WHO, approximately 5.2 billion tobacco products

are manufactured in the world every year.

As shown I above bar diagram, acknowledging the trends of tobacco user all around the

world, there are many tobacco-based products manufacturing nations around the world and some

of them are, China, India, Brazil, Zimbabwe, Indonesia, U.S.A., Mozambique, Pakistan and
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many more as per the reports in the year 2020 (Shahbandeh, 2022). The opening and

development of the tobacco business in the Third World Countries like China, Malaysia, India,

and Africa can be seen hugely and make a huge impact in country’s economy as there are huge

number of tobacco users all around the world, which generates a huge income for tobacco

businesses.

Socially Responsible Marketing

Socially marketing can be defined as a marketing strategy that companies and businesses

uses in order to grow their for-profit business through partnership with philanthropic and

community organizations. Social responsible marketing (SRM), is sometimes referred as an

ethical corporate marketing or green marketing that companies adopt in order to put an extra

focus on attracting consumers who want to make positive difference in the society with their

purchase. For this, a company can do marketing keeping social and environmental aspects in

consideration while building their product or marketing their product. There are four key aspects

of socially responsible marketing and they are, ethical, legal, economical, and philanthropic

(Abratt & Sacks, 1988). The factors that include socially responsible marketing are safe product

design and development, treating clients and customers well, and communicating a positive

message (Gordon, 2021). For an example; Nike being a sports line business, while doing socially

responsible marketing, it should focus in three key areas and they are diversity and inclusion,

community investment, and environmental investment.

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Answering the Questions from Case 4-6

Response 1

Using the model provided in the case study, the chart provided is a decision tree that is

used to incorporate the ethical and social responsibility into business decision. In the first

question, we are asked to analyze whether the decision efficiently optimizes the common good or

benefit of the business firm, society, the economy and the individual.

Looking from the tobacco business point of view, the answer is yes, because these

businesses make a huge amount of money by selling tobacco products to its huge number of

population. This generates great income and the income earned by these businesses are directly

and indirectly contributed to the nation’s fund in the form of tax, royalty and many other

governmental charges. These nations are making huge profits by doing business in the Third

World International Markets.

Similarly, if we see it from the point of view of society and economy then, we should

never forget its effects and consequences. It is unethical for tobacco companies to target young

ones because among the records of people dying from using tobacco, teenagers are the highest in

number. As per the reports suggests, tobacco kills up to half of its users and it kills more than 8

million people each year and among them teenagers are the most (WHO, 2021). Although

tobaccos business has good prospects in business, we should never forget that the high nicotine

and tar contents in tobacco are life taking and harmful to people’s health.

Response 2

Over the time period, looking at the data and records, tobaccos users in the world are

decreasing day by day. Over the past 2 decades, overall global tobacco users has fallen from
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1.397 billion in 2000 to 1.337 billion in 2018. As projected by WHO, by 2020, there will be 10

million fewer tobacco users as they have stopped growing and has been declining.

Some of the alternatives strategies or solutions that should be confronted by the

government all over the world are as follows:

 Pictorial health warnings,

 Bans on tobacco advertising,

 Implying high taxes in tobacco products which make tobacco products expensive to

purchase,

 Stopping illicit trade of tobacco products,

 Monitoring tobacco use and prevention policies,

 Offering help to tobacco users to quit tobacco use and may more.

Response 3

U.S. government should absolutely stop supporting U.S. Tobacco Company’s interests

abroad because making profits off people’s health is not a joke and sounds very much unethical

ad selfishness. Not only U.S. but also every nations should be stricter and make reluctant

decisions regarding the expansion of tobacco industry and the industries that have been targeting

teenagers in order to expand their business.

Response 4

As mentioned earlier, tobacco products are contributing huge economic benefit to a

nation as it generated a lot of income and certain portion of that income goes to the government’s

fund. This fund helps government and nation to develop other sector of a nation. Moreover,

marketing is a big part of selling products and gaining profits for any kind of companies. It is a

work of creativity and we should not let our creativity go. So, in such case, I wouldn’t
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recommend stop marketing of tobacco products that is not illegal but what I think and say is,

proper rules and regulations should be set in the sector of tobacco business which limits the user

of tobacco products. Proper monitoring of marketing of tobacco products would be done in order

to prevent false message, fallacies, and false impression up to the people, mainly the teenager

ones.

Conclusion

Nonetheless, despite from the economic benefit and income that the tobacco business

generates, it should be slowly and gradually eradicated from the society so that people will not

have any health problems related to smoking or using tobacco. Alternative means mean of

controlling tobaccos use should be adopted so that less number of people will die in the future

due to the use of tobacco. The government might suffer due to low revenue income from these

companies but it is worth comparing with the health of millions of people all around the world

References
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Abratt , R., & Sacks, D. (1988). The Marketing Challenge: Towards Being Profitable and

Socially Responsible. Journal of Business Ethics, 497-507.

Gordon, J. (2021, September 28). Social Responsibility in Marketing - Explained. Retrieved from

The Business Professor: https://thebusinessprofessor.com/en_US/principles-of-

marketing/social-responsibility-in-marketing

Myers, M. L. (2012, August 16). World’s Largest Tobacco Use Study Shows Vast Scope of

Tobacco Epidemic and Urgent Need for Countries to Act. Retrieved from Campaign for

Tobacco-Free Kids: https://www.tobaccofreekids.org/press-releases/2012_08_16_lancet

Shahbandeh, M. (2022, January 21). Tobacco production worldwide 2020, by country. Retrieved

from Statista: https://www.statista.com/statistics/261173/leading-countries-in-tobacco-

production/

WHO. (2019, December 12). WHO launches new report on global tobacco use trends. Retrieved

from World Health Organization: https://www.who.int/news/item/19-12-2019-who-

launches-new-report-on-global-tobacco-use-trends#:~:text=During%20nearly%20the

%20past%20two,use%202000%2D2025%20third%20edition.

WHO. (2021, July 26). Tobacco. Retrieved from World Health Organization:

https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/tobacco