Reviving a Tobacco Tradition

Source from:  by Diana in Wisconsin JSOnline July 1, 2007 07/05/2007

(Farms sprout again, with demand for less-carcinogenic crop) When Rick Sime walks through a field of burley tobacco, he sees opportunities and a way to remain connected with his rural heritage. The Vernon County high school teacher, baseball coach and tobacco farmer grew up on a family farm that raised a few acres of tobacco every year, partly as a way to generate some extra cash. For decades, farm families such as Sime's in south-central and southwestern Wisconsin raised a few acres of tobacco to generate extra cash. The leaves grown here were used in chewing tobacco or to wrap cigars. Now tobacco giant Philip Morris USA has discovered that burley tobacco, used mainly for cigarettes, that is grown in Wisconsin has lower levels of cancer-causing chemicals than plants grown in the mid-South. At a time when it seems like the crop would be disappearing, this could mean a new era in an old Wisconsin tobacco industry that's nearly faded from the landscape. In fact, tobacco money helped pay for Sime's college education. "It was the only way I was going to achieve my goals and dreams," he said. The state's burley crop has gone from almost no acreage two years ago to about 200 acres this year. That's significant, given an acre of burley can be worth $4,000 before expenses, more than six times the value of corn. Most burley is grown in Kentucky, Tennessee and other Southern states. Kentucky leads the nation in annual burley production, with about 106,000 harvested acres, according to the National Agricultural Statistics Service. But faced with tobacco shortages, Philip Morris is expanding its farm territory. "American tobacco is the backbone of the cigarette blends we use here," Philip Morris spokesman Bill Phelps said. "We are working with growers in Wisconsin this year." Low production Overall tobacco production in Wisconsin has plummeted to the point where it's barely measurable in the $5.6 billion a year state agricultural industry. Sixty years ago, the labor-intensive crop covered nearly 30,000 acres in the state. Today, that has shrunk to about 1,000 acres and is confined to a few small regions, including Dane, Rock and Vernon counties. Much of the decline stemmed from increased public awareness about the health hazards associated with tobacco products. Some of the decline also resulted from the end of a Depression-era price controls system that helped keep tobacco farmers in business. Sime is raising only about an acre of burley this year. But he's feeling encouraged, given that Philip Morris is signing contracts for it and the plants grow well here. "You could make a living at tobacco farming," Sime said. "It wouldn't be easy, but you wouldn't need hundreds of thousands of dollars" for land and livestock. Initial testing found that tobacco grown in Wisconsin had less nitrosamine, a precursor to cancer-causing carcinogens, said David Fischer, University of Wisconsin Extension's Dane County crops and soils agent. It has something to do with the growing climate of longer, cooler sunny days in the summer. "When I worked with the tobacco company representatives last year, they were surprised to learn that it would be daylight at 5 a.m. here and would not get dark until about 9 p.m.," Fischer said. The biggest challenge for farmers is protecting their tobacco against blue mold, a spore that's crept up to Wisconsin from as far south as Cuba. Tobacco, especially burley, is a labor-intensive crop. Harvesting the plants and stripping the leaves, by hand, is tedious manual labor. "Some tobacco growers have said the price of burley would have to go up quite a bit before they would get into it," said Tim Rehbein, University of Wisconsin Extension's Vernon County crops and soils agent. Risky business But some farmers have found that tobacco was worth their time, even if they spent summers bent over at the waist, toiling in the fields. "I grew up with it," Sime said. "For me, the nice thing was it brought our family closer together." Tobacco money helped pay for a lot of small farms in southern Wisconsin, said Norm Monsen, whose family farm near Stoughton has grown tobacco for decades. "If extra income was needed, tobacco was a great crop," he said. "It paid for my college education back in the 1970s. We had a small dairy operation, but we grew tobacco to help pay the bills." Some tobacco farmers won't talk about their crop, given public sentiment against smoking and tobacco products. Sime said he is aware of the negatives, but he sees growing tobacco as a way for people to stay connected with farming even if they have full-time jobs in town. "It's not feasible for me to invest in a lot of crops and animals," said Sime, who teaches agriculture at Seneca High School. Tobacco companies have also shown interest in Illinois, Ohio, Indiana and Pennsylvania as new areas to grow burley. Though U.S. burley production could reach 240 million pounds this year, demand for the crop is closer to 300 million pounds, experts said. Strong market "Fortunately, strong markets have allowed every pound of burley to find a home," said Roger Quarles, a Kentucky tobacco farmer and president of the Burley Tobacco Growers Cooperative Association. Philip Morris officials declined to say how much burley they want from Wisconsin. "The tobacco companies will never really tell you that," Quarles said. "For the short term, at least, we think that tobacco has a very bright future. . . . We don't think the current demand is going to last 30 years, but farmers live from year to year." Some Wisconsin farmers aren't interested in a crop that's labor intensive and costs roughly $1,000 an acre to grow. It's also risky, given that an entire tobacco field can be destroyed by a hailstorm. But there are always risks in farming, regardless of the crop. "Most farmers have a little risk-taking attitude in them," Sime said. Enditem