Zimbabwe Tobacco Production May Rise 38% This Season

(Bloomberg) Zimbabwe’s tobacco production may climb 38 percent to 170 million kilograms this season as more farmers start growing the crop, according to the country’s Tobacco Industry and Marketing Board.
Output may rise from 123 million kilograms last year, said Andrew Matibiri, the board’s chief executive officer, by phone today from Harare, the capital.
Tobacco production in Zimbabwe is still below peak levels of about 236 million kilograms achieved in 2000, before President Robert Mugabe’s Zimbabwe African National Union-Front party sponsored often-violent seizures of most white-owned farms. Output slipped to a low of 58.6 million kilograms in 2009, reflecting the effects of a political and economic crisis which peaked during 2008. Continued