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Editorial: Tobacco growers' folly 

Many of Ontario's remaining tobacco farmers apparently could not see the writing on the wall that was clear to everyone else.

Society is taking strong measures to stamp out smoking. There is little future in continuing to grow a deadly and addictive product.

But tobacco farmers complain they are being driven out of business by the province's tough anti-smoking measures and are demanding the government bail them out.

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Promise of help for tobacco farmers unfulfilled, marketing board chairman says 

Fred Neukamm is a man running short on patience. The chairman of the Ontario Flue-Cured Tobacco Growers' Marketing Board appeared Monday before the Ontario Legislature's standing committee of finance and economic affairs and pleaded the case for the government to live up to its promises. "We need a fulfillment of the promise for immediate assistance," Neukamm said. That promise was made by the Liberals as they campaigned in the provincial election. "As of yet, we've not seen that promise fulfilled," Neukamm said outside the room at the Four Points Sheraton where the committee heard him and a long list of groups appearing to make their point before the budget is handed down. Neukamm said the tobacco growers are looking for assurances from the provincial government on whether they are prepared to sustain the tobacco industry as long there is consumption. If the answer to that is issue is yes, Neukamm said long-term strategies are needed.

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Critical tobacco choices at hand 

Tobacco farmers must begin planting the seeds of this year's crop in a few weeks, but many have yet to decide whether to take a chance on tobacco in a post-buyout world.

Keith Parrish is a lifelong tobacco farmer, as were his father and grandfather. He says he'll keep growing tobacco in spite of the uncertainty of the market.

Some say they will stick with the crop that has provided a good living to North Carolina's farmers for decades. Others say tobacco is just not worth growing anymore.

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Tobacco farmers rally for buyout 

More than 40 tobacco farmers travelled to London yesterday to stop another Liberal campaign promise from going up in smoke. The crowd quadrupled at the pre-budget consultation hosted by several MPPs when the farmers, led by officials with Ontario's Flue-Cured Tobacco Growers' Marketing Board, arrived to urge the government to keep its pledge and give their troubled industry $50 million in compensation in the upcoming provincial budget.

"We are now a community in crisis," Fred Neukamm, chairperson of the tobacco board, said of his 1,000 members.

"The collapse of the cod fishery and the demise of entire communities in Newfoundland (is) an appropriate analogy."

Although the federal government has offered $67 million to buy out tobacco farmers hoping to leave the industry, the Ontario Liberals' $50-million campaign pledge -- essentially to help those same farmers with the transition -- hasn't been realized, Neukamm said.

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Taxes on cigarettes gain support from tobacco groups 

In what may be a sign of the Apocalypse, tobacco farmers are encouraging the Kentucky General Assembly to increase the state's tax on cigarettes.

Tobacco farmers and farm groups hope the money raised would be used by the state to offset money they had expected to receive at the end of December from the Phase II Tobacco Settlement. Because of a North Carolina judge's ruling last month, that money may be months in coming - or it may not come at all.

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Farmers, family say good-bye to local tobacco auction 

Lewis Brinley Jr., stood with his hands in his pockets staring out at an almost empty tobacco warehouse floor Thursday morning.

In 1945, he was there when Big Burley Warehouse was erected and Thursday he was there to see its last sale.

As a night watchman, Brinley, whose farm surrounds the tobacco warehouse, saw generations of Nelson Countians bring crops to the Bloomfield market. In its heyday Brinley remembers tobacco stacked as far as the eye could see with trucks and wagons waiting on the road to bring crops in.

A sign hanging above the Big Burley offices echoes his memories, "Pride in Tobacco 5,000,000 LBS., 1981-1982."

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LETTER: What about jobs in tobacco fields? 

It is all fine and dandy to hold this debate about smoking in public places. What concerns me is that I have heard nothing about the tobacco farmers. Most of my friends put themselves through university by harvesting tobacco for the summer.

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• House ready to consider tobacco plan / Buyout bill leaves FDA regulation out 

A $10 billion buyout for American tobacco farmers heads for the floor of the U.S. House today, but a decision to shield tobacco from Food and Drug Administration regulation left the measure's outcome uncertain.

Both Republican and Democratic senators weighed tactics that could prevent the measure from coming to a vote in the Senate.

The two tobacco provisions, and their political implications on the North Carolina Senate race, have emerged as focal points of sprawling tax legislation that would provide more than $130 billion in tax cuts for businesses in the next 10 years.

The provisions would bring about $3.8 billion to nearly 76,000 people who grow tobacco or own quotas in North Carolina.

One of the Senate candidates, Rep. Richard Burr, a Winston-Salem Republican and member of the conference committee that approved the measure Wednesday, is billing himself as the buyout's crucial mover. In response, his Democratic opponent, Erskine Bowles, flew to Washington to join in lobbying for the buyout provision, which would end the Depression-era quota system.

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Unlikely allies push for federal tobacco quota buyout 

Their motives are different, but it’s a common outcome being sought by the American Cancer Society and South Carolina tobacco farmers that sent the groups on a joint road trip this week.

The “Better Together: FDA/Tobacco Buyout Truck and Hound Tour” made the organizations unlikely partners in the quest to push U.S. Senate-passed legislation for government tobacco regulation and a tobacco company-funded farmer buyout. The American Heart Association and the Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids supported the tour as well...

The American Cancer Society is hoping the passage of the Senate-approved bill will reduce the number of harmful ingredients added to cigarettes while making advertising campaigns that target children even tougher to carry out, said Lisa Turner, state director of tobacco initiatives for the ACS...

South Carolina tobacco farmers are sharing the bandwagon out of a desire for economic relief through a buyout. They also are calling on an emphasis on regulating tobacco products rather than the crop itself.

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DIMON's First Quarter Earnings Increase 21% 

DIMON Incorporated (NYSE: DMN) today announced that net income for its first fiscal quarter ended September 30, 2002, excluding market valuation adjustments for derivative financial instruments, was $13.3 million, or $0.30 per basic share, a 21% increase over the year earlier net income of $11.0 million, or $0.25 per basic share. . .

Sales and other operating revenues for the first quarter were $270.9 million, compared to $288.7 million for the year earlier quarter. The reduction reflects somewhat lower shipment volumes from North America and Africa, partially offset by higher shipments from Asia. Shipments from South America were relatively consistent with the year earlier quarter. Worldwide trading conditions for leaf tobacco continue to be favorable, and DIMON's uncommitted inventories remain at an optimal level.

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Tobacco company seeks witnesses to aid defense 

A tobacco-company attorney asked a federal judge yesterday to let the tobacco companies talk to witnesses - who also might be members of a class suing the industry - to help defend themselves in the farmers' antitrust lawsuit against the industry.

Tobacco-quota holders and farmers allege that the tobacco companies, including R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. of Winston-Salem, and leaf buyers "anti-competitively" cut the priceof tobacco that they bought through a conspiracy to rig bids at auctions and by reducing their purchase intentions in aneffort to cut the federal tobacco quota.

In the 11/2-hour hearing before Judge William Osteen of U.S. District Court, Stephen Patton, an attorney for Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp., said that if the companies can't talk to the witnesses, their defense would be "severely" hampered.

The class covers holders of flue-cured and burley quotas who held quota at any time from February 1996 to the present, and all flue-cured and burley tobacco growers who sold their tobacco over that period. . .

Patton said that the companies don't want to talk to witnesses as potential class members but as people who are "observers and knowledgeable about the facts." . .

A trial is scheduled to begin in March 2004.

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Court will not stop creation of tobacco marketing centers 

GREENSBORO -- Judge Ben Tennille of the North Carolina Business Court denied today a request by a group of warehouse owners to stop the creation of 14 marketing centers by the Flue-Cured Tobacco Cooperative Stabilization Corp., which the warehouse operators contend will put them out of business.

Tennille, in a 19-page opinion, also granted Stabilization's motion for summary judgment in the case and denied the warehouse owners' summary judgment motion.

The Stabilization marketing centers, essentially auction warehouses, won't charge farmers commissions on the tobacco they sell.

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• Tobacco Farmers, Quota Holders Gain Ground In Lawsuit 

A federal judge has ruled that a lawsuit filed by tobacco growers and quota holders alleging bid-rigging against cigarette manufacturers can be class action.

This allows all other quota holders and tobacco holders to be included although they not have signed the original litigation. According to Keith Parrish of Coats, U.S. Judge William Osteen presiding in Greensboro made the ruling Wednesday. This means there are now 500,000 plaintiffs, Mr. Parrish said.

"It's a good day for farmers. A lot of folks were feeling very desperate," he said.

The lawsuit has been several years in progress. First, high-profile attorney Alexander Pires had to get farmers committed. Then, it has been waiting in the court system and going through changes.

Originally, farmers and quota holders were suing because of the master settlement distribution from cigarette manufacturers. That suit maintained the federal and state attorney generals and cigarette companies ignored the farmers in their deliberations and subsequent compensations.

However, Mr. Parrish said, the lawsuit has evolved and now it is an anti-trust suit. . .

The litigation now maintains the cigarette companies acted in collusion by price fixing and creating an environment deterimental to tobacco farmers and quota holders.

Mr. Parrish said no matter where you went in the tobacco market or what state, the prices cigarette companies were offering for tobacco were the same. "Everything was bringing the same price," he said.

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Universal Leaf Tobacco Added to Farmers' Antitrust Lawsuit 

Universal Leaf Tobacco Co., the world's top independent leaf tobacco merchant, was added as a defendant in an lawsuit that alleges U.S. tobacco companies illegally conspired to cut purchases from farmers, costing the growers billions of dollars, the company said in a regulatory filing.

The case, currently pending in federal court in Greensboro, North Carolina, claims tobacco companies that control the market for the crop, including No. 1 cigarette maker Philip Morris Cos., have worked together for years to reduce U.S. buying.

The suit claims the tobacco companies ``violated antitrust laws by bid-rigging at tobacco auctions and by conspiring to undermine the tobacco quota and price support program administered by the federal government,'' Universal said in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

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Tobacco firms ask dismissal of case / Growers charge antitrust breach 

Philip Morris and other cigarette makers are asking a federal court to throw out a lawsuit by about 6,000 tobacco growers and quota holders accusing the tobacco companies of violating federal antitrust law.

In a motion to dismiss the lawsuit filed Thursday, lawyers for Philip Morris contended the growers and quota holders essentially were attempting to preserve the federal tobacco program, and “that is clearly beyond the scope of the antitrust laws.”

“While the goal of the antitrust laws is to enhance competition and thus reduce prices, plaintiffs seek to invoke the antitrust laws to increase the price they are paid for tobacco and to ensure that the Federal Tobacco Program . . . is not replaced with a free market,” the tobacco companies said.

The cigarette companies also said the lawsuit failed to provide enough detail to back up its allegation that manufacturers manipulated the tobacco auction system.

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