President Chakwera appeals to tobacco buyers to ensure farmers reap the rewards of their hard work

* Also urged tobacco farmers to do the right thing by growing high quality tobacco in order to get the best from buyers

* We can’t continue producing low quality leaf and then expect to get the best from buyers

Maravi Express

President Lazarus Chakwera has urged tobacco stakeholders in the country to continue working together in harmony to create a vibrant industry — also appealing to them to ensure that farmers reap the rewards of their hard work.

Chakwera made the remarks on Thursday during an engagement with officials from the Ministry of Agriculture and Tobacco Processors Association at Kamuzu Palace in Lilongwe where the Malawi leader advised the stakeholders to maintain sanity in the industry by developing quick solutions every time they are faced with challenges.

“Whenever faced with challenges, let’s handle them quickly,” he is reported as saying on a report on Malawi Government Facebook page. “Let us continue the engagement, the collaboration and avoid putting spanners in the works.

While appealing to the buyers to ensure that farmers reap the rewards of their hard work, President Chakwera further urged tobacco farmers to do the right thing by growing high quality tobacco in order to get the best from buyers.

“We can’t continue producing low quality leaf and then expect to get the best from buyers. There is no need for the President standing on the podium to castigate anybody. We just have to do the right thing,” he said.

He also challenged the industry players to ask themselves why the country continues to struggle with forex issues, even when the tobacco season is over, saying: “We talk of tobacco as a forex earner, but after the season is over, you don’t see the forex.”

Tobacco Commission acting Chief Executive Officer, Evans Chilumpha commended the President for creating a cordial working relationship in the industry, due to his open-door policy and for assenting to the Tobacco Industry Act, saying the move will go a long way in resolving some of the sticky issues in the industry.

On his part, Limbani Kakhome, chairperson of Tobacco Processors Association, asked government to intensify security to deal with illegal cross-boarder tobacco trading.

He also asked government to intensify efforts to ensure that people who do not grow tobacco are barred from participating in the business, saying: “Let me also ask government to control over supply of the crop on the market to avoid price crash.”

In his response, Minister of Agriculture, Sam Kawale assured the gathering that they are working around the clock to deal with illegal cross–border trading of tobacco.

In January, when Minister Kawale visited one of the tobacco fields in Traditional Authority (TA) Sandiraki in Chiradzulu, he said the government is committed to promote tobacco farming in all regions of the country as there are more markets internationally that are set to buy Malawian tobacco.

He added that the Ministry is committed to continue supporting farmers and working with buyers to offer good prices for the farmers to realize good profits — hence his visit that was aimed to understand the challenges facing the growers.

“Ministry of Agriculture works with small, medium and large-scale farmers to find out how we can support them in the tobacco industry,” he said. “In the field we visited today, the family has been growing tobacco since 2001 and over the years they have been meeting challenges which we have been addressing.

“Most of the issues which they had have been addressed in the recent tobacco bill that has just been passed and the reason we came is to assure the farmers that government is taking care of the problems raised.”

Kawale, therefore, encouraged farmers to embrace tobacco farming, saying tobacco can be grown anywhere in the country adding the Ministry is yet to embark on a massive campaign to encourage farmers to grow more tobacco since there is plenty markets.

A tobacco farmer whose field was visited, Wyson Komwa told Malawi News Agency (MANA) that he has been growing tobacco for 21 years but has been realising low profits due to low prices.

In the previous growing season, Komwa realised about K4.7 million and he hastened to say with support from government he can do even more in the tobacco industry together with his fellow farmers and continue contributing to the country’s development.

He, therefore, hailed the Minister for finding time to visit farmers and hear their problems, a gesture described as courageous to farmers as well as those who aspire to start tobacco farming in the area.

Recently, Times360Malawi reported that one of the country’s tobacco buyers, JTI Leaf Malawi has released a total of K1.2 billion to its contracted 8,600 tobacco growers as one way of supporting them.

This comes as with just days to the opening of the 2023/2024 tobacco marketing season and JTI’s corporate affairs & communications director, Limbani Kakhome was reported as saying the company understands that the growers do not have enough money to finance their farming activities at this time hence the support.

“Tobacco production is quite involving and therefore as a company we felt we should lift the financial load off the shoulders of the growers by giving them back the money they deposited with us as collateral at the start of the season.

“This money was supposed to be recovered at the end of the season after they have sold the tobacco but our farmers are loyal and we are releasing the money now,” Kakhome said.

A beneficiary, Davie Namoni, thanked JTI for the collateral, saying it will go a long way in supporting the growers during this time when they are preparing their tobacco for the market — adding that the JTI growers have been fully covered and the tobacco vendors can’t come near them for offers.