Poor tobacco sales wake-up call
Government has described last season’s poor tobacco prices as a wake-up call to the tobacco industry.
Principal Secretary in the Ministry of Agriculture, Irrigation and Water Development Erica Maganga said the fall in prices resulted from poor leaf quality.
She, therefore, asked farmers to learn from the incidents and follow best practices in the coming seasons.
“Tobacco is still the backbone of our economy only that due to some factors perpetrated by ourselves such as poor quality of the leaf, the commodity fetched low prices. It is, therefore, important that farmers learn from this incident and follow best practices in future to heal the industry,†she said.
Maganga was speaking on Thursday during the graduation ceremony of the first diploma in agriculture congregation from the Agricultural Research and Extension Trust (Aret) at Mwimba College of Agriculture in Kasungu.
On his part, Minister of Agriculture, Irrigation and Water Development Professor Peter Mwanza urged the graduates to help government improve the agriculture sector by avoiding defection into other fields.
