Emphasis on training as new tobacco season starts

Zimbabwe’s Tobacco Industry and Marketing Board (TIMB) and the Farmer’s Development Trust have started preparing for the 2015-16 tobacco season by training farmers in the sorts of good agricultural practices that should allow them to produce the high quality leaf required by the market, according to a story in The Herald.

The 2014-15 tobacco marketing season was characterized by farmers’ complaints about low prices at the auction floors and by merchants’ complaints about poor quality tobacco being offered for sale.

The training covers everything from seedbed preparation to the presentation of tobacco on the market.

The board is also covering negative factors such as foreign-material nesting, side marketing and paying auction floor workers with the intention of influencing prices.

Speaking at a Nyamazura Training Center, TIMB Manicaland regional manager Emmanuel Matsvaire said the training was being offered to both new and old farmers. “We have 62 farmers on the training programme,’ he said.

The training is free and has been benefiting most farmers who attend.’