Auction floors battling with congestion

legislation was the main reason for continued congestion at the county’s three auction floors.
The auction floors have battled to serve large numbers of tobacco growers since the start of the marketing season in February. While the number of floors has gradually increased from one to three, farmers are still spending days at the auction floors.
TIMB chief executive Dr Andrew Matibiri said stakeholders had not been implementing provisions of the Tobacco Marketing and Levy Act.
According to the Act, farmers are supposed to supply estimates, register with the board and pre-book their tobacco before delivering their crop to the auction floors. Dr Matibiri said over the years small-scale growers were not required to book their tobacco before delivering the crop to the floors.
“From 2003 to 2004 small-scale farmers did not require to book their tobacco because we were trying to encourage them to grow the crop.
“We cannot continue to give them preference as they now account for 82 percent of the total number of growers,” he said.
Dr Matibiri said enforcement of provisions of the Act such as pre-booking, submission of estimates and growers’ registration would ultimately end congestion at the floors.
“We are exploring measures that we can use to improve marketing of tobacco among them selling of pre-booked tobacco.”
He said the number of growers bringing unbooked tobacco had gradually gone down.
Millennium Tobacco Floors chief executive Richard Chabata concurred with Dr Matibiri that farmers now appreciated the the need to book their crop.
“Advance booking assists us to manage congestion at our floor,” he said.
Meanwhile, Dr Matibiri said there were other personal reasons why farmers were spending days at the floors.
“Most farmers would be waiting for their transporters to ferry them home or some do not leave the floors after booking,” he said.
The three auction floors are currently handling about 15 000 bales of tobacco daily. – New Ziana.