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Indonesian tobacco growers and their regional counterparts ended a two-day meeting, dubbed the first Asia Tobacco Forum, in Jakarta on Tuesday by revealing a plan that basically consisted of doing what they have already been doing — pleading with national governments not to adopt the World Health Organization’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control.

Countries that adopt the framework would, among other things, commit themselves to ban flavored cigarettes, which include clove-favored cigarettes, or kretek, the mainstay of the Indonesian tobacco industry.

Meanwhile, the domestic tobacco industry is fighting on another front.

The World Trade Organization on Tuesday began hearing an Indonesian trade dispute with the United States over the latter’s ban of flavored cigarettes.

Indonesia claims the ban is discriminatory because menthol cigarettes, most of which are produced in the US, were not banned.

Citing numerous studies, the US says flavored cigarettes encourage teens and children to begin smoking, and make it harder to quit.

The stakes are high for tobacco farmers and cigarette producers in Indonesia, where a toddler recently gained international renown for his clove cigarette habit.

The industry employes an estimated 6 million people, including tobacco farmers, production workers and vendors.

Around Rp 180 trillion ($20 billion) worth of cigarettes are produced each year, including $564 million of exports in 2009.

The industry claims millions of jobs could be at stake over the WHO framework and the US ban on clove cigarettes.

Sudaryanto, the chairman of the Indonesian Tobacco Alliance (Amti), said the framework presented a tremendous challenge to the Indonesian tobacco industry.

Ninety-three percent of cigarettes produced in Indonesia are kretek.

“Although Indonesia has not signed the FCTC, we will still be impacted since it will eliminate our ability to export kreteks to any country adopting the framework,” he said.

A total of 168 countries have signed the WHO framework, and are ready to debate its adoption at the domestic level.

Roger Quarles, the president of the International Tobacco Growers Association, on Tuesday vowed to take the fight to the health, agriculture and industry ministries in each country ahead of the next WHO meeting on tobacco in Uruguay scheduled for November.

Fuad Baradja, head of the education unit at the Indonesian Smoking Control Foundation (LM3), said national governments should not buy cigarette producers’ argument that adopting a ban on flavored cigarettes would devastate the industry.

“Cigarettes will always be around. There will never be a total ban on cigarettes. This particular ban is intended to discourage younger smokers,” he said.

Fuad said Indonesia needed to ratify the WHO ban on flavored cigarettes to slow the accelerating rate of smoking in the country as cigarette companies become more creative in seeking new customers.

“Flavored cigarettes are more and more creative. There are cappuccino flavors, different kinds of fruit flavors. All these flavors disguise the natural flavor of the cigarette itself,” he said.

Louise Baker, technical officer at the WHO office in Jakarta, said there was no justification for producing flavored cigarettes, which she said served only to make smoking more attractive to teenagers.

“It’s really concerning seeing a 14-year-old girl buying chocolate-flavored cigarettes, because the flavor is familiar to her. Several years later, she would be already addicted to the smoke,” she said.

Baker said the WHO was concerned about the fate of the workers and farmers that might be affected, and she urged the government to create a program to slowly shift farmers from growing tobacco to other crops and to retrain tobacco industry workers.

Yos Ginting, a director at cigarette company PT HM Sampoerna, declined to comment on the magnitude of the challenges facing his industry.

Sampoerna, as a member of Amti, would adhere to any decisions made by the organization, Yos said.