Stick to sustainable ways of curing tobacco, growers urged

THE use of coal and electricity as an alternative source of energy for curing tobacco is critical to the growing of the crop in a sustainable and environmentally friendly manner, an agricultural expert has said, saying continuing use of fuelwood could not be sustained.

Local tobacco farmers are largely relying on wood for curing the crop since the switch over to small-scale production, although the coal companies are now making a comeback on economic grounds and supplying coal in tobacco areas and teaching farmers how to use it.

The large plantations had been converting to coal.

Small-scale growers have been urged to grow fast- growing fuelwood trees if they wish to retain wood as the fuel, and not cut any more indigenous woodland.

Vast quantities of wood are burned to cure tobacco, contributing to massive deforestation.

Zimbabwe Farmers Union director Mr Paul Zakariya asserted that tobacco farmers were destroying trees as they use it for curing their tobacco, urging them to resort to coal and electricity as a way to preserve the environment.

“The future of the tobacco industry heavily depends on producing tobacco in a sustainable and environmentally friendly manner, hence there has been campaigns to encourage farmers to use coal as an alternative source of energy as well as desisting from cutting down indigenous trees,” he said.

In many tobacco growing countries, evidence indicates irreparable environmental damage from tobacco agriculture, particularly when associated with the deforestation necessary to increase farmland for tobacco growth and cure tobacco plants.

The crop poses a particularly difficult dilemma for development as its production has generated a wide range of employment, income, foreign exchange and other cash- contributing effects, but there are growing concerns not only about the health hazards involved in tobacco production, but also about the environmental unsustainability of the crop in terms of excessive use of wood.

Legislation requires farmers to use coal and other clean sources of fuel in curing tobacco, but most have been cutting down trees illegally arguing that they could not afford to buy alternatives sources of energy like coal.

A village head in Banket, Mr Victor Mharadzi, said most tobacco farmers were now using coal in curing their crop.

He said they had long abandoned the practice of buying firewood.

“Farmers can’t afford to buy gum tree firewood since their produce is sold at a very low price, now they have resorted to using coal as a way of curing tobacco and various companies have come up to train us on how to use this fuel,” he said.

Mr Mharadzi said coal was efficient in curing tobacco just like firewood, and through this method they were hoping to reforest their area.

Coal has been used for many years now to cure tobacco and it is still being decentralised to all parts of the country were the crop is mostly grown.