China Tobacco Shaanxi Industrial Corporation (CTSIC) is partnering in Zimbabwe with local firm Pacific Cigarette Company (PCC) to manufacture cigarettes, according to a story in The Standard.
The partnership aims to produce a new line of cigarettes, called Acacia Series, that will use Zimbabwean tobacco and Chinese flavors initially to target mainly the large Chinese community resident in Zimbabwe but later the more-than one million Chinese people living throughout Africa.
CTSIC executive Bai Gang said the introduction of the Acacia range of cigarettes was an attempt to widen the company’s base.
Gang said his company was responding to a proposal by China National Tobacco Corporation for Chinese tobacco companies to co-operate with overseas tobacco businesses.
Meanwhile, the acting Chinese ambassador to Zimbabwe Zhao Baogang told journalists that local production of cigarettes would ease the burden on the Chinese community, which had been spending a lot of money to import tobacco products.
Local production would mean more value addition that would create jobs for Zimbabwe’s people, he added.
According to PCC Global CEO Yves le Boulenge, the partnership, the first to be signed between an African cigarette manufacturer and a state-owned Chinese tobacco company, would have a positive ripple effect on local tobacco production.
“Many people know that there is tobacco produced in Zimbabwe, but not many know that it is actually the best in the world, so this partnership will also help in elevating the image because we will be exporting,” he said.
Tag: Zimbabwe
Adding value in Zimbabwe
More growers registered
Tobacco grower registrations in Zimbabwe for the 2018-19 season have increased by 65 percent to 162,028 from those of the previous season, 98,233, according to a story in The Herald citing figures from the Tobacco Industry and Marketing Board.
Of the 2018-19 registered growers, 34,845 registered for the first time, which seems to indicate that 28,950 have returned to tobacco.
However, the increase in registrations has largely been influenced by the need for growers to obtain individual numbers so that they benefit from the introduction of foreign currency incentives.
Changes to the way that payments are made to growers have made it difficult for the them to share money after selling their crops because they are no longer paid cash. The money is now being deposited in bank accounts or paid through EcoCash.
Tobacco production has been on the increase during the past due to an organized market and the recent introduction of an input scheme by the government.Little profit in growing
Zimbabwe is forfeiting at least US$27 on every kg of unmanufactured tobacco that it exports, according to a story in The New Zimbabwe quoting the Finance Minister Mthuli Ncube.
Speaking at an investment conference in Switzerland last week, Ncube said that Zimbabwe was one of the biggest producers of leaf tobacco and that the bulk of what it produced was exported in unmanufactured form.
Zimbabwe’s more-than 100,000 growers had produced a record flue-cured crop this year of 252.5 million kg.
But the average price had gone down.
And the average price of about US$3 per kg for unprocessed grower tobacco and US$6 per kg for processed tobacco, compared with between US$30 and US$60 for tobacco cigarettes, Ncube said.
Therefore, by exporting unprocessed tobacco Zimbabwe was forfeiting at least US$27 per kg that could be accruing to the country.
The story said that Zimbabwe was looking for foreign direct investment to boost its economy so that it could become a middle-income country by 2030.Early plantings down
Zimbabwe’s farmers have so far put about 7,000 ha under flue-cured tobacco, a figure that is almost 50 percent lower than that recorded by the same time last year, according to a story in The Herald.
The latest weekly statistics from the Tobacco Industry and Marketing Board show that farmers have put 6,572 ha under the crop so far this season, which compares with 11,945 ha during the same period of the previous season.
The president of the Zimbabwe Commercial Farmers’ Union, Wonder Chabikwa, said the decline in tobacco hectarage was due to farmers being wary of the climatic conditions this season, with rainfall forecasts pointing to an El Nino effect.
“Tobacco hectarage this year is lower than that of last year due to farmers being cautious about the quality of the rainy season,” he said.
“They may decide to increase the hectarage after the first rains.”Growers told to diversify
Zimbabwe’s flue-cured tobacco growers are being encouraged to diversify into other high value export crops such as chia, oil seed and cigar tobaccos, according to a story in The Chronicle.
Although flue-cured tobacco is one of Zimbabwe’s major foreign currency earners, cigarette-tobacco consumption is seen as being under threat in some countries from products such as electronic cigarettes.
The Tobacco Industry and Marketing Board (TIMB) corporate communications manager, Isheunesu Moyo, said yesterday the promotion of chia production among tobacco farmers was meant to ensure growers had an all-year-round source of income.
Moyo said that farmers were being trained to grow chia and to engage in horticultural.
Chia, he added, was an ideal crop for diversification since its seeds were in demand abroad and it therefore had good potential as a foreign currency earner.
TIMB has had all its field and technical officers trained in chia production so that they can impart the necessary skills and knowledge to tobacco farmers.Growing rewards
More than 124,000 Zimbabwean farmers have so far registered to grow flue-cure tobacco during the 2018-19 season, up by about 47 percent on the more-than 84,000 who had registered by the same time last year, according to a story by Elita Chikwati for The Herald.
At least 30,000 of the farmers who have signed up to grow flue-cured in 2018-19 are first-time registerees.
According to Tobacco Industry and Marketing Board (TIMB) figures, all Zimbabwe’s tobacco growing provinces except Masvingo have registered an increase in registrations.
The figures show that by September 20, 124,220 farmers had registered to grow flue-cured tobacco for the 2018-19 season up from the 84,688 who had registered by September 20, 2017.
Mashonaland Central, with 49,838 registrations (up from 31,991) has so far recorded the highest number of registered growers.
According to Chikwati, the increase in registrations has been brought about largely by the need for each farmer to obtain a grower number, without which he cannot benefit from foreign currency incentives.
The government in 2016 implemented an export incentive scheme, which rewards growers for helping to generate foreign currency.
Before the introduction of the incentive scheme, some farmers used to sell their tobacco using other farmers’ grower numbers.Record crop grown
Zimbabwe’s growers produced a record volume of flue-cured tobacco during the 2017/18 season, but concern has been expressed about the toll being taken on the country’s forests, according to a Xinhua News Agency story.
“In the just-ended 2017/18 season, a record 252.5 million kg of tobacco with a value of just over US$737 million went through our contract and auction floor systems,” the permanent secretary at the ministry of agriculture, Ringson Chitsiko, was reported to have said while addressing a workshop on Thursday.
“This amount of tobacco is 34 percent higher than that sold in the previous season and also surpasses the highest amount of tobacco ever sold in the country of 236 million kg in the year 2000.”
Chitsiko said the bulk of the 2017/18 crop had been produced by small-scale, communal and A1 growers who were predominantly the beneficiaries of the government’s land reform program and the recently-introduced command tobacco program, which was being administered through the Tobacco Industry & Marketing Board (TIMB).
Meanwhile, Chitsiko lamented the high levels of deforestation being caused by the use of firewood for curing tobacco.
He said as much as 300,000 ha of indigenous forests were being lost annually and that tobacco curing was responsible for about 15 percent of that loss.
“This is despite Statutory Instrument 116 of 2012 which clearly states that each tobacco grower must establish a woodlot from which they can harvest and fuel their tobacco curing requirements,” he said.
Chitsiko added that the government would work together with growers to protect natural forest resources.
Earlier this year, Zimbabwe’s Federation of Farmers Union chairman Charles Chabikwa said that tobacco farmers were threatening to boycott a reforestation levy ahead of the opening of the 2018 marketing season.
From January 2015, the government introduced a levy on all tobacco sales at a rate of 1.5 percent in the first year and 0.75 percent in subsequent years as part of a sustainability initiative aimed at funding the planting of trees to replace those burned as fuel in curing tobacco.
“The levy has been in effect for three years, with close to US$20 million collected from farmers and not a single tree seedling has been planted or sustainable tobacco curing projects embarked on,” said Zimbabwe Tobacco Association chief executive, Rodney Ambrose.
“It is our view that the levy should be removed effective this 2018 season and the funds accumulated to date first accounted for and utilised by farmer stakeholders.”
The Tobacco Industry Marketing board said of the US$19 million collected since 2015, US$4 million was in the board’s account.
Something needs to be done because, under the Sustainable Tobacco Program, from 2020, global cigarette companies will not buy leaf tobacco produced in an unsustainable manner, which includes tobacco cured using coal.
According to the Sustainable Forest Association, about one third of tobacco produced in Zimbabwe is cured using coal.Pests determine prices
Tobacco growers in Zimbabwe have started transplanting tobacco seedlings to fields under irrigation, according to a story in The Herald.
Midlands Provincial crop and livestock officer Madeliner Magwenzi said growers with irrigation facilities, mainly in the Gweru and Kwekwe districts, had undergone thorough training by Agritex and various tobacco training institutions, including the Tobacco Industry Marketing Board and the Tobacco Research Board to improve their agronomic practices.
“Irrigation tobacco is now being transplanted and we are urging tobacco growers to apply systemic aphicides and nematicides during the transplanting stage of tobacco to avoid the spread of insect transmitted diseases,’ she was reported as saying.
Magwenzi added that growers were being trained in integrated pest management because the anticipated El Nino weather conditions could be associated with more and early pests and diseases.
Tobacco farmers needed to be wary of pests while they were transplanting because the application of the wrong pesticides could lead to pest resistance, pest resurgence and environmental pollution.
Magwenzi said that the training bodies would continue to educate growers on pest management because such management affected yields and quality, and ultimately profit margins.
The Midlands Province is aiming to plant 500 ha under irrigated tobacco this season.A question of poisoning
An Italian member of the EU Parliament has asked the Commission what steps it is taking to reduce the risk of tobacco poisoning among tobacco farmers and their families.
In a preamble to her questions, Barbara Matera said that when the proper safety procedures were not adhered to, the risk of tobacco poisoning among farmers was high.
‘Zimbabwe, in particular, has experienced a large number of tobacco poisoning cases, which can be attributed to a lack of education about the condition and a lack of funding for the proper preventive equipment,’ she said.
‘This sickness also greatly affects children who help out with the harvest in rural areas.’
Matera said tobacco was Zimbabwe’s largest export product, and its largest agri-food export to the EU, before asking:
‘What is the Commission doing to promote education among tobacco exporters?’
‘What can the Commission do to provide adequate equipment and protection for farmers, especially those with children?’
The Commission is due to answer in writing.Time is a great stealer
According to a Zimbabwe Herald story dated July 26, the country’s flue-cured-tobacco growers have delivered a record crop of 239.8 million kg.
And, with sales due to end tomorrow, one other record could be set: the longest period in which prices have not increased.
The Herald reported that growers had been paid $700.9 million for their 239.9 million kg, which puts the average price at US$2.92 per kg.
That’s a lower average price than was paid in 1996, US$2.94.
Contracted growers fared better than did those who sold at auction. The former were paid US$603.9 million for delivering 204.5 million kg of tobacco, for an average price of US$2.95 per kg.
The latter, meanwhile, were paid US$97.0 million for delivering 35.3 million kg, for an average price of US$2.75 per kg, which means that they were paid 6.5 percent less for their tobacco than was the average grower of 1996.
