Tobacco Prices Higher in Malawi This Year

Tobacco prices higher in Malawi this year

LUSAKA, May 6 (Xinhua) — Tobacco growers in Malawi maybe wearing beaming faces over this year’s attractive prices at the floors, but their hearts are worried about next year as they fear that the good prices might attract more growers unless the government puts in place a control mechanism to ensure that there will be no overproduction.

Since the floors opened in Lilongwe, Limbe and Mzuzu last month, the farmers have sold their leaves at between 1.70 U.S. dollars and 1.60 dollars per kg while last year at the opening of the floors the leaves were sold at an average maximum price of about 1 dollar per kg, Nation Online of Malawi reported on Sunday.

Official figures indicated that a Malawian tobacco farmer spends about one dollar to produce a kg of the leaf.

One of the tobacco farmers said if the government does not control the growing of tobacco to meet market demand each year, prices of the crop should be expected to go down again in the years to come. “This year we are happy the prices are good, but with prices now improving, more people will be interested in growing tobacco next year. So, if government will not put in place stiffer regulations then production will increase and buyers will have no choice but to offer low prices,” the farmer said.

He warned that with liberalization of tobacco growing still in place, the government efforts to revive the tobacco industry will not bear much fruit.”Already we have tobacco grading and presentation problems this year largely because some of the players are intermediate buyers, who have no idea how tobacco should be handled,” he warned.

But Patrick Kabambe, principal secretary in the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security said it is not in the interest of the government to start controlling crops people want to grow. “Government is not interested in controlling tobacco growing. The only thing is that tobacco, unlike other crops, is very difficult to grow–you have to know what to do. So, as government we will support farmers by providing technical support because we have a responsibility to maintain the quality standards of Malawi tobacco,” he said.

Kabambe said overproduction of tobacco can not just happen overnight as the farmers to overproduce will need to have the capacity which currently Malawian farmers do not have.

“In the past control was being done through registration, but now it is difficult to know who is a genuine farmer and who is not. But we are not interested in that,” he said.

However, Kabambe said that the government has been able to control other players from getting involved in the industry by banning intermediate tobacco buying.

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