The UN labour organisation has agreed not to renew controversial funding from tobacco companies for charitable programmes, but has left the door open to cooperating with the industry on future projects. The International Labour Organization (ILO) Governing Body finally reached a compromise late Thursday on the issue of the UN agency's ties to the tobacco industry, in a bid to end years of acrimonious debate on the issue. The ILO has long been under fire for partnerships with several of the world's biggest tobacco companies on charitable programmes in a range of countries, which expired last year.

The agency had justified its ties to the tobacco companies as a way of helping improve the working conditions of the some 60 million people involved in tobacco growing and production worldwide.

But it faced criticism that the partnerships risked jeopardising global efforts to regulate tobacco use and reduce the negative health impacts of smoking. In the decade ending last year, the agency received more than $15 million (13.5 million euros) from tobacco companies towards two "charitable partnerships" aimed at reducing child labour in tobacco fields in four African countries.

But health and anti-tobacco advocates have been clamouring for the agency to join other UN agencies - most notably the World Health Organization - in flatly refusing to engage with the industry.

Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2019