Harare, (New Ziana) – Tobacco seed sales for the forthcoming cropping season have exceeded 636 kilogrammes, which are enough to cover 106 000 hectares of tobacco, statistics released by the Tobacco Research Board on Tuesday show.

This is 79 percent more than 335 kilogrammes of flue-cured tobacco seeds, enough to cover 59 000 hectares, which had been sold during the comparable period in 2023.

In a related matter, statistics released by the Tobacco Industry and Marketing Board on day 74 of tobacco auctions on July 1, 2024, show a total of 212 .2 million kilogrammes of the crop worth US$732,2 million had been sold at an average price of $ 3.45 per kg, a drop of 23.7 percent in volume compared to last year.

During the same period in 2023, 278, 2 million kg of the golden leaf worth US$841.5 million had gone under the hammer at an average price of $3.02 per kilogramme. In the 2022/23 cropping season, the country produced a record 296 million kilograms of tobacco worth US$896 million, but output in the 2023/24 season is expected to fall to around 235 million kg owing to the El Nino induced drought.

Tobacco is the country’s second largest foreign currency earner after gold. At least 98 percent of the locally produced tobacco is, however, exported in semi-processed form and calls are growing for value to be added to the crop. New Ziana