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Brighton Gumbo, Business Reporter
THE number of registered tobacco growers for the 2015/16 season in Matabeleland region has dropped by 50 percent to six compared to 12 recorded last year.
According to the Tobacco Industry Marketing Board (TIMB) report for week ending October 30, 2015, Matabeleland region, which has been slowly venturing into the tobacco sector in recent years, continues to record lowest number of growers.
Only one A1 farmer and five A2 farmers from the region have registered out of a total of 62,114 registered growers countrywide.
The government had said it would only establish a tobacco auction floor in the region once there is improved production.
This was after some farmers complained over logistical challenges involved in transporting their produce to Harare.
TIMB public relations and communications manager Isheunesu Moyo said Matabeleland was the least from all the seven tobacco growing regions.
“To date about 62,114 growers have registered for 2015/16 season compared to 82,624 growers who had registered in the same period last year,” Moyo said.
“The new registrations for 2015/16 are now at 8,336 as compared to 16,008 last year in similar period.”
He said at the moment, Mashonaland West has the highest number of registered growers for the 2015/16 cropping season with 23,109 growers followed by Mashonaland Central with 22,231 growers.
The tobacco body attributed the general drop in registered growers across the country to delays in registration as most farmers prefer a stop order payment system.
It, however, said the registration exercise would be allowed until opening of auction floors although it would attract a fine of up to $100.
Meanwhile, Moyo said the seasonal exports for 2015 were $ 542,5 million from the sale of 103,9 million kgs compared to 2014 exports, which were $ 534,3 million from 97,7 million kgs.
While the tobacco sector contributes significantly to Zimbabwe’s economy, experts have called for the establishment of a tobacco processing plant locally.
Analysts say the country is losing about 60 percent of real value of the processed crop from exporting unprocessed golden leaf.
Online Reporter