Tobacco Farmers Receive Aid for Crop Switch

Source from:  nst.com.my By : Alina Simon  10/09/2007

Tobacco farmer Zakaria Dollah, 80, has plenty of reasons to smile this Hari Raya. He was among 800 recipients here to receive the RM2,000 government aid to help tobacco farmers in Kelantan switch to other commercial crops by 2010. The money was the second instalment paid to 3,466 farmers in the state. They received RM2,500 last year and the final payment of RM500 will be given out next year. With his four sons now working on his two-hectare plot, Zakaria is leaving the decision to them. "It is up to them but for me, I want to rear cattle. I have two now and I want to buy another one with this money," he said after the handing over ceremony by Deputy Finance Minister Datuk Awang Adek Hussin yesterday. National Tobacco Board state officer Zaabar Jaafar said around 1,000 farmers had switched to planting other crops like kenaf, corn, vegetables, watermelon, tapioca or rearing cattle and fish. Among the successful ventures are 83 farmers involved in a contract farming programme in Teluk Kemunting, supplying a variety of vegetables to the Selayang wholesale market in Selangor, and the 170ha Nelson corn farm run by 100 farmers, with the crop exported to Dubai. Enditem