Tobacco Treaty Threat to Economy
An economist from Kingdom Bank, Mr Witness Chinyama, said that the ratification of the 40th country posed a serious threat to the country's agro-based economy.
"Tobacco is our major foreign currency earner. This development will mean that we won't be able to generate as much foreign exchange as we used to.
"Since our economy is on a larger scale agro-based, we find ourselves in a very difficult situation.
"The way forward would be to find alternative means, for example we could direct our focus to platinum and gold."
Mr Chinyama added that though it was important to look at alternative means, tobacco still offered the best economic return per hectare as compared to other crops grown in Zimbabwe.
He said a hectare of tobacco is 22 times more profitable than cotton, 57 times more profitable than maize and 59 times more profitable than soya beans.
He also said that tobacco was a springboard for the production of other crops.
Mr Chinyama's argument is based on the fact that tobacco growers in Zimbabwe produce some 35 percent of the country's maize, 30 percent of beef, 30 percent of the total wheat output and 20 percent of the national soya beans production.
"According to the tobacco and commercial yearbook of 1995, tobacco financed the spectacular improvement in farming methods which have led to Zimbabwe achieving self-sufficiency and exportable surpluses in food and cash crops," he concluded.
Posted by change101
at 9:18 PM EST
