Zimbabwe: Government to Meet Tobacco Production Targets

Source from:  The Herald (Harare) 15 August 2008 08/18/2008

ZIMBABWE is on course to reach its production targets for flue-cured tobacco of 130 million kilogrammes for next year judging by seed sales that have been very high. A total of 399 kilogrammes of tobacco seed has been sold to date which is sufficient to cover 65 000 hectares that can yield the intended target. Of the 399 kg, 153 kg were sold by the Zimbabwe Tobacco Seed Association while the remaining 236 kg were sold by the Tobacco Research Board. With regards to burley sales, a total of 880 grams had been sold by Friday last week. Of these 715 grams were sold by the Zimbabwe Tobacco Seed Association and 165 grams was sold by the Tobacco Research Board. The 880 grams are enough to cover 245 hectares while the target hectarage for the crop has been set at 500 ha. Tobacco Industry Marketing Board acting chief executive, Dr Andrew Matibiri was upbeat about the prospects of meeting the target for burley. "Burley is a dry land crop that thrives in hotter climate so sales will go on until October, which is the cut off date for planting as opposed to the one for flue-cured which is August," he said. "More farmers are still coming in to buy seed, an indication that this year's target of a 65 000 hectarage of land up from last season's 61 000 hectares is achievable, if we receive inputs in time," added Dr Matibiri. Farmers have made a passionate plea for the speedy distribution of inputs in order to ensure a successful season. Tobacco production has been largely affected by the non-availability of fertilizers, both Compound C and ammonium nitrate, agro-chemicals and electricity outages (power cuts) that affect the irrigation of seedbeds. The shortage of electricity has already impacted negatively on this year's winter wheat programme, with farmers failing to meet this year's target as some of the crop has been written off due to moisture stress stemming from the fact that farmers failed to get enough electricity to irrigate their crop. The same factors together with prolonged wet spells contributed to tobacco farmers failing to meet their target during the past season where a record 495-kg of tobacco seed was sold against a target of 120 million kg. Enditem