Tag: Kutsaga Research Station

  • Zimbabwe to Phase Out Ethylene Dibromide

    Zimbabwe to Phase Out Ethylene Dibromide

    The Kutsaga Tobacco Research Center in Zimbabwe announced the phaseout of ethylene dibromide (EDB) effective Dec. 31.

    In a notice to the industry, Kutsaga said the measure was necessary to ensure that the country’s leaf tobacco meets international standards. More than 90 percent of Zimbabwe’s tobacco crop is exported.

    “No person shall treat any tobacco with a remedy which is not registered nor reap of offer for sale any tobacco treated with nonregistered remedy,” the notice read. “Furthermore, any tobacco so treated will be destroyed without compensation to the grower.”

    Zimbabwean tobacco farmers have used the agrochemical for soil fumigation for many years. According to Kutsaga, there are several alternative nematicides and soil formulations available for nematode control. The research station is also evaluating new active ingredients.

    EDB joins a growing list of banned fungicides, growth regulators, herbicides and insecticides in Zimbabwe. Other prohibited chemicals include benomyl, butralin and alachlor.

    The agrochemical’s discontinuation notice comes as the Zimbabwean tobacco sector anticipates record-breaking tobacco yields for the 2024–2025 growing season, thanks to heightened prospects of good rainfalls due to the La Nina weather phenomenon.

  • Zimbabwe: Farmers Urged to Clear Fields

    Zimbabwe: Farmers Urged to Clear Fields

    Photo: Taco Tuinstra

    Tobacco growers who failed to clear their fields of residue from the previous crop by the May 15 deadline will face stiff penalties, Zimbabwe’s Kutsaga Research warned.

    To break the life cycles of tobacco pests and pathogens, along with incidental infestations such as mealybugs and false wireworms, Zimbabwean law requires growers to clear their fields of all stalks from the previous crop before they prepare their seedbeds for the next growing season, according to The Herald.

    The Plant Pests and Diseases Act requires this to be done by May 15 of every year. This year, seedbed preparations may start no earlier than June 1 while planting should not commence before Sept. 1.

    Officials from the Tobacco Industry and Marketing Board, Agritex and Plant Quarantine Services will be carrying out routine inspections of growers’ fields to ensure compliance, Kutsaga Research said in a notice.

    “It is every tobacco grower’s responsibility to be proactive and ensure good agricultural practices and efficient use of aphicides as we enter the news season in order to slow down proliferation of aphids so as to minimize all viral transmissions,” the organization wrote.

    Violators risk fines equivalent to US$100 per hectare.

  • Zimbabwe Aims for $60 Billion Tobacco Industry

    Zimbabwe Aims for $60 Billion Tobacco Industry

    Zimbabwe plans to create a $60 billion tobacco industry by 2028, according to The Herald.

    The government is currently working to increase processing and value addition of tobacco from 2 percent to more than 30 percent to boost earnings.

    Zimbabwe currently earns about $1 billion from its annual tobacco exports, which is 6 percent of the global market.

    “In terms of the value transformation strategy, we must tap into the value of our tobacco,” said Obert Jiri, permanent secretary for Lands, Agriculture, Fisheries, Water and Rural Development, noting that the tobacco produced is worth over $60 billion when fully processed across the value chain.

    “We understand that most of our tobacco is exported, and the strategy is to tap into that value chain. We are happy that some are doing cigars, some little value addition in terms of cigarette production. The strategy we have as a government is really to ensure that we encourage investments in proper value addition so that we don’t export our raw materials.”

    According to Kutsaga CEO Frank Magama, the board is breeding tobacco seeds for international markets. “We have trials that are happening in Italy, Brazil, China, and our varieties are also grown in China. The direction that we take from the government, in terms of breeding, is that we must make sure that we have quality products. We excel in tobacco, so our products are now found in the region where we are able to earn foreign currency for the country,” he said.

    The Kutsaga Tobacco Research Board recently introduced climate-smart tobacco varieties, enabling farmers to continuously have good harvests despite climate change and new pathogens.

    Zimbabwe’s plans are part of the government’s ambitious Tobacco Value Chain Transformation plan.

  • Coal to Tackle Cost and Deforestation in Zim

    Coal to Tackle Cost and Deforestation in Zim

    Photo: Michal

    Zimbabwe’s Tobacco Industry & Marketing Board (TIMB), Kutsaga research station and Hwange Colliery Co. have jointly developed a special coal facility to help reduce tobacco farmers’ production costs and address deforestation concerns, reports the Zimbabwe Independent.  

    The facility will benefit TIMB-registered growers with active grower numbers. TIMB said negotiations were underway with transporters to ensure that the coal is delivered to farmers on time and at affordable rates.

    “The high cost of tobacco production is one of the main challenges bedeviling tobacco farmers in Zimbabwe,” TIMB spokesperson Chelesani Tsarwe told NewsDay Farming, referring to the prices of production inputs, energy and other farming necessities.

    The coal facility, she said, will help tobacco farmers realize significant savings in the curing process.

     Zimbabwe Tobacco Growers Association president George Seremwe welcomed the arrangement. “The outcry has been us tobacco farmers through our associations, lobbying and advocating reduction on the cost of production and they started sort of goal rolling by engaging different suppliers in this case, Hwange Colliery Co. to come up with cheaper modalities, better way of cushioning the farmer in the form of reduction on the cost of production,” he said. “We are very happy and pleased to hear such an initiative happening.”

    More than 70 percent of Zimbabwe’s  tobacco crop is cured using unsustainable wood, with deforestation increasing, according to Zimbabwe Tobacco Association CEO Rodney Ambrose.

    “While the industry embarks on reforestation programs, more efficient curing systems and alternate sustainable curing fuels, stop-gap measures need to be put in place in order to ensure that we maintain our production levels and protect the livelihoods of thousands of farmers,” he said.

     “One of the measures is coal, and to reduce the cost of purchasing and delivering the product to farmers.”

     Zimbabwe achieved a record crop of 296 million kg of tobacco for the 2022-2023 season, earning nearly $1 billion from leaf sales.

     This year’s sales volumes put Zimbabwe on track to achieve its target of 300 million kg by 2025, as formulated in the Tobacco Value Chain Transformation Plan, ahead of schedule.

  • The Scientific Approach

    The Scientific Approach

    The Tobacco Research Board in Harare | Photos: Taco Tuinstra

    Boosting Production Through Innovation

    By Taco Tuinstra

    The tobacco transformation plan aims to boost production without expanding the farmer base or laying claim to significantly more farmland (see interview with Minister of Agriculture Anxious Masuka). To help the government achieve its objectives, the Tobacco Research Board (Kutsaga) (TRB) is developing improved seed varieties, innovating to reduce post-harvest losses and creating education programs for tobacco growers.

    According to TRB CEO Frank Magama, the key to sustainable growth is improving yields. Just recently, the TRB released four new flue-cured tobacco varieties developed for marginal growing areas in the south of Zimbabwe, which is dryer than the rest of the country. With traditional tobacco varieties, farmers in that region have been getting yields of about 1,100 per hectare. Magama hopes the new varieties will boost that number to 2,500 kg per hectare.

    The varieties have been issued on a so-called limited-release protocol. “We allow 20 farmers to grow one hectare each so we can get more data and learn whether the new varieties are suitable,” says Magama. If, in consultation with the growers, the breeders are satisfied with the results, they will move to the next stage of the trials. In the second season of evaluation, the TRB will distribute seed for these varieties among a larger number of farmers for further testing. In addition, tobacco merchants will test-smoke cigarettes manufactured with tobacco from the new varieties to make sure they deliver the desired flavor. Altogether it will take between three years and four years from the start of the trials until the new varieties will be available to all growers in the targeted areas.

    Recently, the TRB released four new flue-cured tobacco varieties developed for marginal growing areas in the south of Zimbabwe, which is dryer than the rest of the country.

    Reducing Losses

    The TRB is also looking at reducing post-harvest losses. According to Magama, smallholder farmers may lose up to 50 percent of their crops due to inadequate handling. “If you look in the field, it may be a 3 ton crop,” he says. “But what goes to auction is perhaps 1.5 tons.”

    The problem starts before the tobacco even leaves the farm. After curing, the leaf is very brittle, and to prevent breakage while moving the leaf from the curing barn to the shed, it must be conditioned. Ideally, this is done with a misting system, but this requires piping and electricity, which are often unavailable in the rural areas. So small-scale farmers may just use boiling water, which doesn’t generate the proper mist. As a result, a needlessly high share of good tobacco ends up as scrap that may sell for perhaps $0.10 per kg—or, more likely, end up as compost.

    “It’s an issue of infrastructure,” says Magama. In partnership with a tobacco equipment manufacturing company, the TRB evaluated a portable firewood steam boiler for tobacco conditioning. This portable unit can be moved from barn to barn and also to grading facilities with ease and without a need for extension pipes. “If we solve that aspects of losses, we can significantly boost yields.”

    We hope that eventually hemp can be grown on tobacco farms, either as a rotation crop with tobacco or eventually as an alternative to tobacco.

    Frank Magama, CEO, Tobacco Research Board

    At the same time, Kutsaga is working to reduce the amount of wood required for tobacco curing and other farm activities. The shift from commercial growing (which uses mostly coal as a curing fuel) to smallholder production has put considerable pressure on Zimbabwe’s forest cover. Innovations such as the rocket barn and Kutsaga’s counter-current barn use up to 50 percent less wood than conventional barns. And while the rocket barn is comparatively expensive, Magama believes farmers can significantly reduce its cost through materials substitution, by making their own bricks, for example.

    The TRB has also been distributing eucalyptus tree seedlings to farmers but with mixed success. Tobacco growers are not always keen to plant trees on land that could be used for other crops. So the board is also working with schools in rural areas. “We donate seedlings and presented it as an educational and commercial opportunity,” says Magama. Tending to the trees is light work—you will need to protect them against termites, for example—and within three years to four years, the schools will have timber that they can sell to tobacco farmers and other users. “The initiative with the schools has gotten a lot more traction than working directly with tobacco growers,” says Magama.

    The TRB is building a model farm at its Kutsaga Station to teach tobacco growers good agricultural practices

    Model Farm

    Another way to improve tobacco yields is through education and training. This is extensively done through what Kutsaga terms tobacco improved productivity sites (TIPS), where training is done on farms in selected tobacco-growing areas. Farmers from the area are provided with all the necessary inputs and then trained year-round on these sites. The TRB is currently also building a 6 ha model farm at its Kutsaga Station to teach tobacco growers good agricultural practices: How do you properly rotate tobacco and food crops, and what else can you cultivate on your farm? “We are also doing this to prepare growers for a future with less smoking,” says Magama. Upon completion of construction of the facility, the TRB will select a grower to live and work full time on the farm with his family. Supported by the best agronomic advice, this farmer will then become a visual model for other growers to emulate.

    Meanwhile, the TRB itself is adjusting to a changing market with declining cigarette consumption. Following the legalization of industrial hemp and cannabis for medicinal use in Zimbabwe in 2019, the board has set up three stations for hemp research. According to Magama, it would be relatively easy for tobacco farmers to get into hemp. “We hope that eventually hemp can be grown on tobacco farms, either as a rotation crop with tobacco or eventually as an alternative to tobacco,” he says. Kutsaga is also investigating crops such as stevia and chia.

    Looking further ahead, Magama would like the TRB to venture into biopharming, using tobacco to develop compounds of value, such as pharmaceuticals or vaccines. He hopes some of the board’s current innovations will help generate money to fund the modern labs required for such endeavors. For the time being, it remains a dream only. If it becomes reality, however, it will provide an unrivaled boost to Zimbabwe’s effort to extract more value from its tobacco business.

    Taco Tuinstra is Tobacco Reporter’s editorial director.Based in Raleigh, North Carolina, USA, he coordinates the work of staff writers and contributors.On his watch, Tobacco Reporter has won several awards for editorial excellence.Since joining the magazine in 1997, Taco has visited more than 75 countries to meet industry representatives in their markets and to report tobacco news firsthand.
  • Great Expectations

    Great Expectations

    Photos: Cavendish Lloyd

    Cavendish Lloyd has started growing low-nicotine flue-cured tobacco in Zimbabwe for shisha.

    By George Gay

    Although it’s unfashionable to say so, I believe there is something most appealing about some aspects of tobacco and the tobacco business, not least because they are naturally part of the Slow Movement. Indeed, they were part of that movement long before it came into existence in the mid-1980s with the realization that there was something to be gained in taking the time to savor certain things—and something being lost in doing things too quickly.

    For instance, though many welcome efficiencies have been introduced to the leaf tobacco business over the years, it always had about it, and still has, a comfortingly unhurried air. I mean, there is, after all, no point in a farmer, at the start of the growing season, standing over her seedlings and shouting, “ready, steady, grow!” And who in their right mind would want to walk quickly through a tobacco warehouse when he could dawdle and savor the aroma?

    Of course, not all aspects of the tobacco business are slow, nor should they be. There is a lot to be said for introducing the sorts of machinery updates and general processing efficiencies and manufacturing efficiencies covered in another story in this issue (see “The Virtuous Loop,” page 36). But, at the same time, there are other aspects of the business that have contraventions of the tenets of the Slow Movement that are to its detriment. I find it sad, for instance, to see smokers racing through their cigarettes as they stand in the cold outside pubs and offices.

    Low-nicotine Virginia flue-cured tobacco has the propensity to absorb the high levels of molasses and flavors that Shisha manufacturers require.

    Unseen Advantage

    Luckily, however, there is a type of smoking that still lends itself to savoring the moment, which comprises mainly the enjoyment of products such as fine cigars, pipes and shisha. Shisha smoking, especially, tends to be part of a relaxed social occasion, and perhaps that is why its appeal is increasing at a time when that of other combustible tobacco products is not.

    And that increase in appeal is occurring, I suspect, without too many shisha smokers realizing there is an unseen advantage in their choice of product, the tobacco component of which could have been grown in a more environmentally friendly way than that of many other tobaccos. Indeed, I, too, didn’t know of this potential environmental advantage until I corresponded recently on the subject of low-nicotine Virginia flue-cured tobacco (LNFCT) with Koen Monkau, the president of Cavendish Lloyd, and Frank Magama, the head of the Plant Breeding Division of the Tobacco Research Board’s (TRB) Kutsaga Research Station in Harare, Zimbabwe.

    Monkau told me his company was experimenting in Zimbabwe with growing LNFCT for use in shisha products, and I assumed the aim of using such tobacco was to try to wean people off smoking as is being attempted in the U.S. in the case of cigarettes. But Monkau explained that, in general, shisha manufacturers required LNFCT (less than 1 percent nicotine) mainly because of its physical characteristics. This style of leaf was pale, white-yellow and very thin, he said, and it had the propensity to absorb the high levels of molasses and flavors that needed to be added to it.

    But this style of leaf also has a number of advantages when it comes to the environment and the cost of producing it, partly because it is closer grown than is standard flue-cured tobacco and partly because of a major reduction in the need for chemical applications. Magama told me it was expected that LNFCT would have lower costs of production with significant savings being made from reductions in the use of fertilizer and the cutting out altogether of systemic and contact suckercide applications. Labor savings would be made because topping would not be required, something that normally involved making several rounds of a crop. And energy and time savings would be made on curing the resultant thinner and smaller leaves.

    At the time of this writing, Cavendish Lloyd was in the process of grading its first trial crop of LNFCT.

    Growing Trials

    Cavendish Lloyd was established in 2011 by Monkau, who has been involved in tobacco for more than 25 years, and his wife, Jiayu Wang, who is vice president of the company. The company’s largest operation in respect of staff numbers is to be found in Zimbabwe, but it operates in the Far East, the Middle East and Europe as well as in other parts of Africa. Overall, it has about 100 employees. It is active throughout the tobacco chain, from the growing of tobacco to the marketing and distribution of cigarettes, though, currently, it does not directly operate any leaf processing or tobacco manufacturing facilities—or, I should point out, offer Cavendish tobacco. It is the exclusive distributor of KT&G products in Zimbabwe.

    Given the company’s close association with Zimbabwe, and the country’s favorable climatic and soil conditions, it is not surprising that this is where Monkau is currently conducting, in conjunction with Magama’s team, LNFCT growing trials and where he intends to expand into larger scale production during the next season, which will run from later this year into next year. And it is not surprising, either, that Magama shares this enthusiasm for Zimbabwe. He told me in an email exchange that he believed there was a combination of factors that made Zimbabwe a suitable country for growing LNFCT, including its resilient grower base, the presence of supportive merchants, a long tradition of growing the crop, and soils that were inherently low in nitrogen, which allowed growers to have good control of plant nutrition when producing LNFCT.

    Asked whether LNFCT varieties were more or less difficult to grow than traditional varieties, Magama said that both required the same attention to detail and good management, though, in the case of LNFCT, some key agronomic practices had to be modified, owing, for example, to the previously mentioned need for less fertilizer and the absence of topping. He added that there was so far no clear evidence about whether it was better to grow LNFCT in the dry lands or as irrigated crops, but he said it was important to note that excessive irrigation or precipitation limited growth and nicotine accumulation through leaching of nitrogen while excessively dry conditions resulted in high nicotine accumulation. Much of the year-to-year variation in nicotine content in a variety was due to differences in rainfall, with everything else being equal.

    At the time of writing, Cavendish Lloyd was in the process of grading its first trial crop of LNFCT, which was grown during the 2021–2022 season by a farmer operating near Marondera, Mashonaland East, and with the help of the Kutsaga team. But it has ambitions to quickly increase its production of LNFCT in Zimbabwe, and it aims, eventually, to become a major player in LNFCT by expanding production into Zambia, Malawi and South Africa.

    Koen Monkau (left) created Cavendish Lloyd in 2011.

    Exponential Growth

    Monkau believes that central and southern Africa can provide significant volumes of LNFCT at competitive prices. And, importantly, having done his research, he believes there is a ready market for such tobaccos. “Within the tobacco market at large, there are some segments that are in decline or stable and other segments that are growing fast,” he told me in an email exchange. “The shisha market is definitely in the last category, with even exponential growth expected in the next few years.”

    Given such opportunities come to fruition, it seems likely that other players will be attracted to growing LNFCT in Zimbabwe, a fact Monkau hinted at when he made the point that establishing an LNFCT production industry in Zimbabwe would be an important step in helping to expand and diversify the country’s tobacco client portfolio.

    Currently, no other companies are growing low-nicotine varieties in Zimbabwe or taking part in production trials. However, it seems that interest is growing. Magama told me the TRB had been involved with low-nicotine trials for the past five years, working with many merchants with different objectives and end-use applications. And the board had been selected, he said, to be part of a three-year global study on low-nicotine tobacco being coordinated by a taskforce of the Cooperation Centre for Scientific Research Relative to Tobacco.

    The plant breeding division of the TRB plays a vital role in low-nicotine trials, conducting research and making available where appropriate the results of that research. The division also makes recommendations when called upon to do so by the Tobacco Industry and Marketing Board (TIMB) and other stakeholders. Again, such cooperation is vital because the TIMB is responsible for authorizing the growing in Zimbabwe of any tobacco variety, and it is the TRB that carries out value for cultivation and use studies, and, on the basis of those studies, recommends or not the variety in question.

    Furthermore, two other government departments, the Seed Services Institute and the Plant Quarantine Services Institute, are involved in ensuring only suitable varieties are grown by processing seed permits and ensuring all phytosanitary issues from the country of origin are addressed before seed importation is made.

    It might seem from the above that obtaining permission for experimenting with new varieties would be complex, but, for instance, authorization for the seed used for Cavendish Lloyd’s trials was processed for the company by the TRB.

    The seed in question was obtained from a company based in Europe that has long cooperated with Zimbabwe and is a stable source of supply. But, in any case, Magama said that, depending on the results of the trial, it was possible seed could be sourced elsewhere if it were necessary to address limitations the original seed might have. Further, local breeding efforts could be activated should there be a business case for this nascent tobacco type, he added.

    Finally, without wishing to interrupt the Slow Movement that inevitably controls the scheduling of research and trials, I need to point out that Monkau intends to introduce some allegro con brio into his enterprise. “We plan to grow 1 million kg green from season 2022–2023,” he said. “This might seem ambitious, but we have spent a lot of time on research and are confident we can make it.”

    George Gay is Tobacco Reporter’s European editor, but his territory spans the globe. Based in London, George has covered the tobacco industry since 1982, initially for a U.K.-based publication and since 2004 for Tobacco Reporter. George’s understanding of industry issues, combined with his keen sense of observation and dry wit, have earned him a loyal following among Tobacco Reporter’s readers.