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• ZIMBABWE: Tobacco Sector Up in Smoke as State Violence Escalates 

Tobacco was the mainstay of the southern African state’s economy during the 1980s and 1990s. The ‘‘golden leaf’’ was the county's main export product, accounting for around 50 percent of Zimbabwe's foreign currency earnings. Some 700,000 people are dependent on the industry for their living.

For decades, Zimbabwean tobacco was coveted by blenders as amongst the finest in the world. According to statistics from the statutory body Zimbabwe Trade (ZimTrade), the country was the second largest producer of flue-cured tobacco after the United States in the 1990s. Its crop was recognised for its quality in major tobacco markets in Europe, Asia and America.

But, since 2000 when the government introduced chaotic ‘‘land reform’’ policies, the tables have been turned. Brazil has since taken over as the world’s second largest flue-cured tobacco producer. . . .

ZTA figures show the decline in output: from 267 million kg in 2000, when the ruling ZANU-PF started to turn the screws on its political opposition, to 202 million kg in 2001; 165 million kg in 2002; 80 million kg in 2003; and a paltry 68 million kg in 2004.

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Zimbabwean leader's reality: Mugabe is Right 

Mugabe fought to liberate a nation of oppressed Africans from a brutal and racist white rule and then built it into a much-hailed economic and social success. What would drive him to preside over its decline and ruin?

Under Mugabe, Zimbabwe fed itself and became a major exporter of food as well as of tobacco and minerals. Literacy and longevity rates shot up. Today, a third of the population is starving and the country has the lowest life expectancy in the world _ just 34 years for women. . . .

Heidi Holland, who recounts the anecdote about God's chosen one in her recently published book "Dinner with Mugabe," says Zimbabwe's leader is an "emotionally weak man" who's never come to terms with some of life's earlier disappointments.

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Farmers Regret Growing Tobacco 

FOR the past two weeks Gloria and Samuel Mwedziwendira’s home has been an open area outside the Tobacco Sales Floor along Willowvale Road in the industrial suburb of Southerton.

They say they are first-time tobacco growers, having occupied a farm in the Bindura area in 2004. They arrived at the tobacco auction floors from Bindura on 3 June and spent another four days waiting for their tobacco to be sold.

Now, the couple says they have been waiting ever since their tobacco went under the hammer to get their pay cheques and return home.

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• New breed of tobacco farmers come to terms with reality  

ZIMBABWE'S new breed of farmers created by Robert Mugabe's chaotic and violent seizures of farmers from whites are a bitter lot. Those who ventured into tobacco cultivation are angry with the government. . . .

As first-time tobacco growers, she said she had come unprepared for a long stay in Harare and admit their stay has been a nightmare. At as early as 5am Angela and scores of others wake up to boil water for their husbands and make breakfast for him in aluminium tins picked up in a bin in the industrial area. . . .

"On Thursday last week names for the cheques that were ready were read out. My name was not there," Angela continues. "Nobody has told us what is going on. They are very rude. They snap at us and tell us 'go back home, your money is coming'. Some are lucky. They got part payments."

When males leave for the auction floor to wait for their payments and sell their tobacco, women take turns to stay on guard and take a quick bath behind the tobacco floors.

"If you are on guard you have to make sure when you see a man approaching you whistle so that the other women bathing cover themselves up," Tarisayi Chirondza joins in. . . .

After weeks of being subjected to inhuman living conditions, tobacco farmers will get a chance of going back to their villages as the country's three tobacco sales floors will close temporarily on Tuesday next week to pave way for the June 27 Presidential run-off.

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Tobacco sales floors to close for elections 

THE country’s three tobacco sales floors will close temporarily on Tuesday next week to pave way for the June 27 Presidential run-off and House of Assembly by-elections.

Tobacco Industry Marketing Board’s acting chief executive, Dr Andrew Matibiri said in a statement the resolution was taken by the TIMB board at its meeting held on Thursday last week.

"The board resolved to temporarily close all tobacco sales on Tuesday June 24, 2008 and re-open them on Monday 30th June 2008.

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Tobacco Farmers to Start Getting Inputs Next Month 

The Tobacco Industry Marketing Board will start disbursing inputs for the 2008/2009 season beginning next month, TIMB's acting chief executive Dr Andrew Matibiri has said.

"We have a bit of everything fertilizers and chemicals but I am not at liberty to disclose figures at the moment," he said. TIMB intends to disburse the inputs as farmers deliver and sell their tobacco at the auction floors. The board has been assisting 7 000 small-scale tobacco farmers with inputs over the past few years.

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Tobacco Deliveries Improve  

Tobacco deliveries to the auction floors have improved over the last few days as the impasse over pricing has subsided. At the Tobacco Sales Floors yesterday, tobacco was fetching between US$3 and US$4 per kg, a slight decline from US$5 last week, while auction sales at the Burley Marketing Zimbabwe were in the region of US$3 per kg.

Contract sales at TSF were ranging between US$1,50 and US$3 per kg. While auction sales passed without incident, some small-scale contract farmers protested over prices for their tobacco. Some farmers alleged that contractors were shortchanging them as they were being made to sell their tobacco under contract when they had received little support from contractors.

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Tobacco sales end prematurely 

Tobacco auction floors opened in Harare yesterday but sales ended prematurely as farmers blocked them protesting against the opening price.

Angry farmers tore up sales tickets and stood on tobacco bales to block auctioneers, while others tied up bales to prevent access.

Only one bale fetched US$3,90 per kg while some sold for between US$1,70 a kg to US$2,50 per kg.

The farmers said they were not happy with the opening price and would be comfortable with a price in the region of US$5 to US$7 a kg.

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Tobacco-selling season expected to start today 

THE 2008 tobacco-selling season, which was postponed from last week to this week, is expected to start today, the Tobacco Industry and Marketing Board has said.

The official opening ceremony was expected to take place at 7.30am at the Tobacco Sales Floors.

"The chairman of the Tobacco Industry and Marketing Board, Mr Njodzi Machirori, advises farmers and members of the industry that the 2008 tobacco-selling season will officially open on Wednesday 30th April 2008 at 7.30am," read part of the TIMB statement.

It was, however, not immediately clear what had been agreed upon with regard to the concerns raised by tobacco farmers, which include the support price.

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Govt sets new tobacco support price 

GOVERNMENT has awarded tobacco farmers a $70 million support price for every US dollar earned for the 2008 selling season, scheduled to open this morning.

The 2008 tobacco-selling season, which was postponed from last week to this week, is therefore, now expected to start today.

The official opening ceremony was expected to take place at 7.30am at the Tobacco Sales Floors.

Although in our business section, which was printed earlier, we carry a story that we were not sure of the outcome of negotiations between growers, the industry and Government, last night Agriculture Minister Cde Rugare Gumbo said the support price was arrived at after consultations with the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe.

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Zimbabwe farmers hold on to tobacco crop in price stalemate 

Zimbabwe's tobacco selling season was called off for the second time in as many weeks Wednesday after farmers withdrew their crop from the auctions citing low prices.

The auction floors in Harare, ranked among the continent's largest, were supposed to open at 7:30 am (0530 GMT), but after around 80 bales went under the hammer, farmers started ripping off the price tags in protest.

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Zimbabwe tobacco farmers protest as inflation soars 

Zimbabwean farmers tore up their tobacco crop in protest on the auction floors of Harare on Wednesday as state price controls to combat hyperinflation threatened to wipe out their profits.

"The price is useless, I would rather keep my tobacco and sell to buyers from Malawi or Zambia," muttered Ottilia Mavhunga, a farmer from Karoi, a town in northern Zimbabwe, as she prepared to take her bales of tobacco away.

The tobacco trading season -- once a key feature of Zimbabwe's business calendar -- had to be called off for the second time in as many weeks after farmers pulled out of the sale, citing low prices given by auctioneers.

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Tobacco floors unlikely to open today 

THE official opening of the 2008 tobacco selling season could be delayed by another day amid indications that there is still no position on issues that were raised by tobacco farmers, especially the support price.

Sources close to negotiations that are taking place to resolve the issues said the selling season, which was deferred by a week, was unlikely to take off today as the matter was being dealt with at the highest level.

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Zimbabwe tobacco sales delayed by currency dispute 

Zimbabwe's tobacco auction opened on Tuesday but trading was postponed a week with farmers demanding a weaker exchange rate to shore up earnings from a crop that was once the country's top foreign currency earner.

If farmers continue to withhold their crop, it could spell more trouble for President Robert Mugabe's government which is battling acute shortages

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Zimbabwe Tobacco Sales Delayed on Currency Exchange Concern 

Zimbabwean tobacco sales were delayed after farmers withheld their crops and demanded the central bank announce the exchange rate they will use.

Growers in Zimbabwe, who sell their crop on the world's biggest tobacco auction floors, are paid mainly in Zimbabwean dollars. The bank traditionally offers producers a rate better than the official level of 30,000 Zimbabwe dollars to the U.S. dollar.

``There's deep concern because the black market rate for U.S. dollars has gone through the roof,'' Shame Mundawaropa, a tobacco farmer from Zimbabwe's northern Raffingora district, said yesterday. ``The gap between the official rate and the black market rate is so wide now that we cannot sell

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