Desperate for hard cash which government has dismally failed to address, tobacco farmers have fallen prey to a syndicate of side marketers who pay cash albeit low for their golden leaf which they re-sell at auction floors in connivance with buyers.
By Tendai Guvamombe
Information gathered by 263Chat at Tobacco Processing Zimbabwe (TPZ) Auction Floors in Harare on Tuesday indicates that side marketers have descended on most rural communities where they are buying the golden leaf at low costs for resell at auction floors in the capital.
According to tobacco auctioning regulations, traders are obliged to produce growers’ number (account) as a requisite to auction the golden leaf but these menacing private buyers have ways of evading this requirement as they go through farmers accredited with growers number.
Tafadzwa Chipadze, a tobacco private buyer, confirmed this, “We realized how we could earn ourselves better monies and venturing in tobacco private buying has developed to be our source of income”.
“I decided to venture into this trade partly due to current economic hardships we are facing and with this line of business am able to generate profit on wider margin as compared to carpentry,” he added.
Another middleman, Shelton Njiva confirmed that their venture pays off as most farmers prefer cash which banks are failing to provide them.
“Currently vending alone no longer permits to sustain a living so I decided to join informal way of buying and selling tobacco from farmers and with this we are able to survive,” he said.
A research conducted by 263Chat also revealed that some contract farmers would prefer side marketers to avoid repaying their debts. Contracted farmers who opt for side marketers would be doing so as a result of crop failure and the decision to avoid auction floors would be done to at least get some money for immediate household needs.
Delise Hwata, Masvingo female tobacco grower scorned private buyers arguing that they are reaping were they did not sow, “This should be urgently castigated, and there is a trade imbalance between a producer and private buyer who at the end gets marginal profits.”
A Tobacco Industry Marketing Board (TIMB) official, Emmanuel Matsvaire is on record encouraging farmers to desist from side marketing so that companies that supported them are not shortchanged.
“We want to encourage our farmers to desist from side marketing so that companies that supported them are not short changed. We urge them also to embrace crop insurance so that in the event of hailstorms they do not emerge as losers,” said Matsvaire.
