Zimabwe Farmers Fume Over Tobacco Prices

Source from:  HARARE 04/07/2005

Zimbabwe farmers angry over the price of tobacco refused to take part in the annual auction of tobacco, one of the country's top foreign currency earners. Some 300 bales of tobacco were sold before hundreds of farmers decided to hang on to their golden leaf saying the 0.25 dollars being offered for a bale was "far too little", auction officials said. The price of tobacco in Zimbabwe is fixed by the state-controlled Tobacco Industry Marketing Board, and farmers want the price increased to at least two dollars. "Selling has been suspended for the time being because the farmers are not happy with the price," said a chief executive at one of the auction floors David Machingaidze. Zimbabwe, the second largest supplier of flue-cured tobacco used in American-blend and other cigarettes on the international market after Brazil, sells most of its tobacco to the European Union and Asia. Zimbabwe's tobacco production has declined steeply since 2000, when the government embarked on a programme of seizing white-owned land for redistribution to new black farmers. Zimbabwe exports 98% of its tobacco crop, and this brings in about one third of the country's desperately needed foreign exchange, making the leaf the country's second largest foreign exchange earner after gold. "The price is just low and unreasonably so," said farmer Noah Pondera who said he paid one million Zimbawe dollars (161.2 dollars) for transport only to bring 10 bales of tobacco to Harare from his farm Hurungwe, 200 kilometres northwest of Harare. "The price being offered is far too little to cover the input costs and loans that some of us have to pay back. "If we can't resolve the pricing issue I would rather burn the tobacco and stop growing the crop altogether," said Pondera. The sale was expected to resume on Wednesday after differences had been resolved. Zimbabwe produced 237 million kilograms of tobacco in 2000 but last year it yielded about 64 million kilograms. Enditem