Mozambique: Governor Guarantees That Niassa Tobacco Will Be Sold

Source from:  Agencia de Informacao de Mocambique 09/21/2011

Maputo - The governor of the northern Mozambican province of Niassa, David Malizane, has guaranteed that all the tobacco produced by peasant farmers in Mecanhelas district will be purchased by the end of this year, reports Tuesday's issue of the Beira daily paper "Diario de Mocambique". In a visit to Mecanhelas, Malizane found that, in almost all the meetings he addressed, peasants complained that the company Mozambique Leaf Tobacco (MLT) has not honoured its undertaking to buy the crop. One farmer in Chissaua locality, Jasten Matola, for instance, alleged that, if a farmer has 40 bundles of tobacco, MLT only buys eight and leaves the other 32 in the hands of the producer. "Here we rely on agriculture, and we produce a lot of maize and tobacco", said Matola. "But our tobacco is bought for very low prices and in small amounts". This situation risks plunging the producers into debt, leaving them unable to pay for their children's schooling and other necessities. To make matters worse, Mecanhelas has recently been inundated with Malawian tobacco, because the Malawian farmers find they are unable to sell it in their own country. So they try to sell it to MLT instead. The Mecanhelas peasants believe this is why MLT is not buying the Mozambican produce - even though it was grown with inputs provided via MLT. Malizane said that, in response to these concerns, he met with an MLT representative who blamed the problem on "interpretation failures" by the MLT purchasing teams. He insisted that MLT has the money to buy all the tobacco produced by the Mozambican farmers it supported, and not tobacco from Malawi. The Mecanhelas farmers also complained that there are no buyers for their surplus food crops, notably maize. Malizane said that this remained a problem in 2011 - but would change next year when the National Grain Institute (ICM) resumes its role as buyer of last resort. Enditem