British American Tobacco South Africa (Batsa) has supported small-scale black tobacco farmers with equipment, funding and training since 2011. Some of these farmers in Limpopo feel used. The support dried up with little warning in 2021, leaving many of them in a desperate financial position. Batsa says that the programme was cut down...
Tobacco use kills about 9,000 Kenyans every year through diseases such as cancer, the Ministry of Health says. In Summary • Head of the Kenya Tobacco Control Alliance Joel Gitali, who won the award last year, congratulated the winners. • Kenyan law stipulates a need for an alternative to tobacco production that protects farmers. A villager who helps...
When we visited a 45-year-old Michael Okong’o at his rural home in Gogo village, West Kanyamkago Ward, Uriri Sub-county of Migori County, the healthy green crops were all we could see. One could hardly tell of the poor climatic condition of the area, with most lands surrounded with rock boulders. Okong’o’s home, sits at the boundary...
Tobacco farmers are responsible for a fifth of the total annual deforestation in Zimbabwe, cutting down trees to burn in their curing barns. While the practice is not permitted, enforcement remains lax, and solutions such as establishing woodlots have not proved fast or scalable enough to address the problem. With Zimbabwe expected to...
The government is on the spot for doing little to address problems facing tobacco growing in Nyanza. Tobacco farming has been practiced in Kuria East and Kuria West constituencies in Migori for many years, enabling many families to cater to their basic needs. The farmers are now calling on the government to ensure fair trade practices...
