TC suspends today’s tobacco sales

The Tobacco Commission (TC) has suspended today’s tobacco sales at the Lilongwe Auction Floors owing to low volumes available.

Last week, TC announced that the market would open thrice a week on Monday, Wednesday and Friday until the growers start bringing more volumes at the market.

In a brief communication issued on Saturday to all stakeholders in the tobacco industry, TC said sales will only resume on Wednesday.

Reads the communication: “Be advised that there won’t be tobacco sales on Monday April 11 due to limited stock. Sales will resume Wednesday April 13.”

TC spokesperson Telephorus Chigwenembe confirmed the development, but said the TC chief executive officer Joseph Chidanti Malunga was the right authority to give more information on the issue.

Malunga could not pick up his phone when we sought his comment on the issue.

However, on Thursday, Malunga downplayed fears of the poor start of the tobacco market saying the market, was opened early when majority of the growers were still preparing their leaf.

He said: “The market is not yet at its peak so we want to stagger so that we match the flow of volumes on the market. You know managing the market involves a lot of workers, so to have them involved, it’s a big cost which we want to manage.

“We believe that in a week or so, we should have more volumes and return to normal daily trading. This is not a challenge by the way, you always start with low turnout and then pick up, therefore, there’s no cause for alarm”.

The tobacco market opened weeks earlier than usual with government justifying the decision, saying it was made to ensure farmers start selling their tobacco early to cushion them from economic challenges.

One of the tobacco buying companies, JTI Leaf corporate affairs and communications director Limbani Kakhome said before the decision to open the market was made, they engaged TC, government and many other stakeholders arguing that the opening of the market was premature, considering the late onset of the rains.

He said: “We have over 100 extension officers that do monitor crop development and are in regular touch with over 8 600 contracted growers that give us the best evidence of the state of the crop.

“As it shows, policy was formulated without taking into account the best and evidence-based data sets, leading into the current situation where the market is operating sub-optimally and making the industry absorb unnecessary costs that make the costs of doing business high for all stakeholders.” AHL tobacco sales general manager Graham Kunimba said on Thursday the market had put up 907 bales for sale against the capacity of 10 000 bales sales capacity a day, while on the first day of sales, the market had 1 057 bales that were offered for sale.