Zambia: JTI Will Not Establish Cigarette Plant

Source from:  Zambia Daily Mail 12/22/2015

JAPAN Tobacco International (JTI) says the company has no immediate plans of establishing a cigarette manufacturing plant in the country as the market is fairly small.

JTI corporate affairs and communications manager Litiya Matakala said in an interview on Thursday that the company focuses on growing the leaf crop in the medium term since the Zambian market is too small to allow for the creation of a plant.

"We are not a smoking country, the market is just too small to enable us establish a cigarette making plant. Our focus for now is to grow the leaf and process it at Tombwe, which has the capacity to process all the tobacco grown in the country," Mr Matakala said.

He said the company is promoting sustainable farming methods by ensuring that its farmers plant trees besides the tobacco. Enditem