Community Voices is a Smokefree Canterbury initiative, featuring Stop Smoking practitioner Teresa Butler and her clients.
A reformed smoker herself, Butler said she came up with the film idea as consultation was under way on the Government's Smokefree Aotearoa 2025 Action Plan.
"I thought: 'I have to capture these stories, how do we do it'?" she said.
Smoking killed Butler’s mother at the age of 72.
"It’s killing our whakapapa," Butler said.
The video is to be launched by the Cancer Society of New Zealand Canterbury West Coast Division.
Deputy manager health promotion Amanda Dodd said the division would time it with the release of the action plan, expected later this year.
In the meantime, she was happy to feature it on Star News and hoped it would raise awareness of the action plan’s smokefree goal.
"I think it’s a really emotive film to watch, people have been very honest about how tobacco has affected themselves, their whanau, their wider community, and the struggles that they face on a daily basis,” Dodd said.
Thirteen deaths in New Zealand a day are attributed to tobacco use.
