Zimbabwe: Power Cuts Hit Tobacco Curing

Source from:  The Herald 03/29/2010

Harare - Erratic electricity supplies in many parts of the country are seriously affecting tobacco curing and grading. This has led to huge losses as the crop is wasted in the field and barns. Recently, a tobacco grower lost her crop to fire while trying to cure the crop using firewood. Mrs Jane Musinachirevo of Hidden Valley in Mazowe said, "My barns cannot use firewood but I had to re-design the structure so that I could cure it that way." But during the curing process, the crop caught fire. "I lost more than 1 500 kilogrammes of tobacco, which is worth more than US$5 000." Mr Collin Homodza, also from Mazowe, said his grading room was in darkness. "I lost 900 crips of tobacco and have already registered a loss," he complained. A crip is the rail that tobacco leaves are hung on as they are being cured in the barn. A conventional barn carries an average of 1 200 crips. According to Mr Homodza, Zesa officials collected the broken down transformer at his farm and promised to replace it but this has taken more time than he expected. "I don't know how much tobacco I will have lost by the time that transformer comes back," he said. In some instances, the farmers have failed to irrigate other crops due to constant power cuts, while others have blamed the electricity disturbances for the breakdown of their irrigation engines. The farmers said despite all this, Zesa was still billing them "excessively". "Sometimes you do not understand how the Zesa officials arrive at the high charges because most of the time the electricity is not available," Mrs Musinachirevo complained. Zesa spokesperson Mr Fullard Gwasira has urged farmers to report all faults quickly, adding that some of the power outages were a result of vandalised infrastructure. Enditem