{"id":77575,"date":"2019-05-03T11:14:54","date_gmt":"2019-05-03T09:14:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.times.mw\/?p=77575"},"modified":"2019-05-03T11:14:54","modified_gmt":"2019-05-03T09:14:54","slug":"poor-start-for-tobacco-sales-at-limbe-floors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/2019\/05\/03\/poor-start-for-tobacco-sales-at-limbe-floors\/","title":{"rendered":"Poor start for tobacco sales at Limbe floors"},"content":{"rendered":"

By William Kumwembe:<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Disgruntled! This could best describe tobacco farmers\u2019 reaction to the start, yesterday, of sales at Limbe Auction Floors, where the green gold rolled out on a low, with growers lamenting low prices and high rejection rate.<\/p>\n

Price tags seen on tobacco sold under auction farming on the opening day ranged from $0.90 (K672) per kilogramme (kg) to $1.40 (K1,045) per kg.<\/p>\n

Most bales were tagged \u2018no sale\u2019 for purported poor quality, among other factors.<\/p>\n

On one of the rolls, out of 35 bales only nine were bought as the other 26 were rejected for an unspecified reason.<\/p>\n

This did not go down well with farmers, who eventually abandoned the sales, demanding improved trends.<\/p>\n

One of the tobacco farmers told a group of his peers that he brought to the market 13 bales but sold one only at $0.90 per kg.<\/p>\n

Another farmer, Edson Katundu from Mayaka in Zomba, said there was no hope on the market this season.<\/p>\n

He brought six bales to the market, of which only two were bought at $0.90 and $1.40.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have no idea about the future. With the start, I have no hope for the market this season. I brought six bales, only two have been bought and the rest have been rejected. Surprisingly, this is quality leaf,\u201d<\/em> Katundu said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Another farmer, Keston Paudala, observed that most of the tobacco sold was of better quality, and was surprised by rising cases of rejection.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe believe that we are being punished for being auction growers. If buyers are not ready, they would rather not buy,\u201d<\/em> Paudala said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

For over two hours, officials were locked up in a meeting in an attempt to address the situation, as the farmers desperately waited within the floors.<\/p>\n

A verdict to resume sales would, however, still not bring a smile on the faces of the farmers, as average prices remained $0.90 after re-opening the market at 11:45am.<\/p>\n

Bales with \u2018no sale\u2019 tags were also still visible, especially at the auction section.<\/p>\n

Ironically, Minister of Agriculture, Joseph Mwanamvekha, who officially opened the market amid high hopes, only toured the contract selling section where the situation was calm.<\/p>\n

Tobacco prices on the contract side ranged from $0.90 to $2.30.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are committed. We expect the market to stabilise. Currently, farmers are selling the lower leaf and the situation would improve,\u201d<\/em> Mwanamvekha said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Figures he provided show that, on the opening day, 4,271 kgs of tobacco were to be traded at Limbe Auction Floors alone.<\/p>\n

Since the start of the market last week,<\/a> over 2,933,54 kgs of tobacco were bought, of which, 2,130,467 were sold at Lilongwe Floors and the rest at Chinkhoma Floors.<\/p>\n

Tobacco is Malawi\u2019s principal foreign exchange earner but for many years, its prices have been declining due to many factors, including worldwide anti-smoking lobby.<\/p>\n

However, Malawi is yet to find an alternative cash crop that can fetch more money like tobacco.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By William Kumwembe: Disgruntled! This could best describe tobacco farmers\u2019 reaction to the start, yesterday, of sales at Limbe Auction Floors, where the green gold rolled out on a low, with growers lamenting low prices and high rejection rate. Price tags seen on tobacco sold under auction farming on the opening day ranged from $0.90 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":77581,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-77575","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77575","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=77575"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77575\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":77582,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77575\/revisions\/77582"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/77581"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=77575"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=77575"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=77575"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}