8 Countries that Produce the Most Tobacco in the World

Tobacco is in very high demand all over the world. Primarily tobacco is used to produce cigarettes. Alongside cigarette, there are several other usage  of tobacco, such as it is processed to make the chewing tobacco, and many other addictive substances. Well, we would like to make something very clear, that we do not endorse tobacco consumption. It is a very harmful habit, both financially and physically. Many people die every day because of this deadly addiction. Now that being said, financially tobacco is a very important product.

Which are the countries that produce the most tobacco in the world? If you ever wondered which are countries that are successfully answering to high tobacco demand coming from smoking factories all over the world, you have come to the right page.

8. Argentina

2013 production: 115,334.00 tonnes

We start this list with a country that is known in the world, not only as one of the biggest tobacco producers, but also as one of the biggest tobacco consumers. Unfortunately, tobacco consumption in Argentina is constituting the second leading cause of death. They are trying to fight this problem by increasing the prices of cigarettes, and raising awareness about the health issues smoking may induce, but they had no significant improvement for now.

7. Malawi

2013 production: 132,849.00 tonnes

Tobacco produced in Malawi for almost a century now. The biggest production growth was seen back in 1970, and ever since then Malawi has been one of the countries known for their big tobacco industries. For Malawi’s economy, this industry is very important, as it brings a serious income. When the tobacco industry decreased in the West, many of the world famous cigarettes brands, like Camel and Marlboro, became interested and started using tobacco grown and produced in Malawi. Their tobacco is known for high nicotine content. Read More>

Migori tobacco farmers' fury as buyers exit

Tobacco farmers in the county are a frustrated lot after some of their key buyers withdrew from the market.

Tobacco and sugarcane are the major cash-crops in the region and a main source of income for most families.

Some of the cigarette companies that had been buying the crop have left and prices for farmers remain uncompetitive.

Edna Mohabe has had to uproot the crop from her two-acre farm and resort to farming maize for subsistence.

“For more than a year, I have held on to the hope that things might get better. I thought another company might venture in or the existing might one upgrade their operations and buy our crop even at a lower rate,” she said.

She echoed the sentiments of over 15,000 tobacco farmers in the region struggling to make ends meet over what could be termed as the collapse of the tobacco sector. Read More>

Swiss Tobacco Factory Facing Closure

Since it was opened in 1938, Fermenta in Payerne, canton Vaud, has been preparing tobacco for international cigarette producers. But a number of factors have led to its decline: fewer people smoke, fewer farmers are growing tobacco, and the strong franc has made production costs double those of rival factories in France, Italy, Germany and Poland.

Burley tobacco, valued locally at CHF17 ($17.60) per kilogram, is being sold to multinational cigarette manufacturers for just CHF4 per kg. As there is a big difference between the production costs and sale price, the branch is supported by a tax on cigarettes: the co-operative society for the purchase of Swiss home-grown tobacco collects CHF0.13 from every cigarette purchased in Switzerland.

The tobacco leaves are harvested mostly in the area around Payerne, but the number of growers is diminishing. At its peak after the Second World War, the Swiss tobacco-growing industry counted more than 6,000 growers for a total production area of 1,450 hectares. Today there are just 198 growers over a total area of 468 hectares. 

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A Brief History of the Tobacco Society

1492: Christopher Columbus was among the first Europeans introduced to the plant. He described fragrant leaves given to him as gifts along with fruits and trinkets. In a move that will surprise few modern scholars of the age of exploration, the myopic Columbus threw the leaves away, believing them worthless.

1531: After European presence in the New World becomes more common, the purposes of tobacco use become clear to them, and cultivation of tobacco crops by Europeans begins.

1548: Brazil, which would later become the South American capital of the African slave trade, begins the mass cultivation of tobacco for export to Europe. By 1560, tobacco has been introduced in Spain, France and Portugal.

Sir Francis Bacon warned about the addictive nature of tobacco.NATIONAL PORTRAIT GALLERY

1610: Sir Francis Bacon, writing three years after Jamestown is established in the tobacco-rich colony of Virginia, declares that tobacco use is on the rise in England, and that once begun, the habit is extremely hard to stop. Read More>

This is it: Cigar box guitars

Robert Nugent of Conception Bay South says he first began building cigar box guitars as part of his step-daughter's homework assignment.

"She had a build your own instrument assignment, and I helped her build a one-string electric guitar," said Nugent.

He first discovered how to make the unique instruments when he came across directions online.

From then on, he was hooked.

Robert Nugent will turn this cigar box from the Dominican Republic into the body of an electric guitar. (Heather Barrett/CBC) Read More>

Tobacco Farmers Rake in U.S.$50 Million

Tobacco farmers have raked in nearly U.S.$50 million from the sale of the crop. The new tobacco payment system has resulted in some farmers spending days camped at the auction floors waiting to process their money. This season, the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe introduced a new payment system where tobacco farmers will no longer get cash as the money will be deposited into their bank accounts.

Farmers at the auction floors complained that the new system had resulted in them staying for a longer period than they used to do when they were getting cash during the past seasons.

Trelawney farmer, Mrs Koshiwayi Gadzikwa said she had been staying at the floors for three days as her money was taking long to reflect in her bank account.

"The process is proving to be long. We have been going to the bank to check if the money is reflecting and we are afraid we may spend the weekend at the floors. We do not have enough money to buy food and we end up incurring huge losses.

"My husband ended up losing his particulars to thieves. We want to go back to the farm and grade our crop," she said. Read More>

Despite Regulatory Pressures, Opportunities in Tobacco Abound

Efforts to increase the legal buying age for tobacco products. Electronic cigarette taxes. Flavor bans. These are just a few issues on the agenda of legislators at every level across the United States.

To date, Hawaii is the only state where consumers must be 21 to purchase tobacco products. But that doesn't mean it's the only place in the nation with a legal buying age higher than the federal age, which currently stands at 18.

Speaking at the 2016 NATO Show in Las Vegas on Wednesday, Thomas Briant, executive director of the National Association of Tobacco Outlets (NATO), noted that 117 municipalities in Massachusetts alone have adopted the age push to 21. The New England state also leads the way in flavor bans — at 43 municipalities. It's no wonder Briant calls Massachusetts a "hotbed" when it comes to tobacco legislation.

Such measures highlight the need for NATO to sharpen its focus on legislative and regulatory issues, bringing an end to its five-year trade show. This year's event marked the last. The association plans to build upon the NATO Local Project, which was founded in 2012 and currently has a three-member staff working directly with retailers to address regulatory issues at the local level. Read More>

Global market for tobacco has stabilised

Even as tobacco farmers kept their fingers crossed due to domestic market uncertainty following imposition of larger pictorial warning on cigarette packs during the middle of the marketing season, International Tobacco Growers’ Association Executive Antonio Abrunhosa opined that “the market may not be worse this year in view of the stable global demand for tobacco.”

The tobacco sector was gripped by crisis last year, the worst-ever since the crop holiday in the year 2000, forcing farmers to commit suicide.

The global market for the principal cash crop stabilised, said the ITGA chief from Portugal, who interacted with farmers in the traditional tobacco growing areas in Prakasam district.

The reduction in demand for tobacco in the U.S. and other countries was not much as in the previous years, he said.

“The pace of the slowdown has come down in the U.S.,” he pointed out, and added that there was a fall in production to the tune of 30 million kg in Zimbabwe, which exported 90 per cent of its produce to other countries.

 

“The inhibiting factor is the excessive health regulations,” he said, referring to domestic manufacturers stopping production from April 1, afraid of the implications of the 85 per cent pictorial warning on cigarette packs on the sale.

The health regulations and heavy dose of taxes on legal cigarettes gave a boost to contraband cigarettes, he argued. Read More>

JTI invests $12m in tobacco industry

JACK ZIMBA, Lusaka THE world’s third largest tobacco company, Japan Tobacco International (JTI), has clearly found its niche in Zambia, four years after entering the market.

Since it set up shop in Zambia in 2011, the company now has about 7,000 farmers under its out-grower scheme in Eastern and Western provinces, with an investment portfolio of US$12 million.

It is not really the numbers that JTI is interested in, but rather in improving the quality of the tobacco it produces.

Hence, one of the major decisions the company made in the recent past was to integrate farming of tobacco into its business in order to influence the quality of the tobacco that ended up at its cigarette factories.

“Previously as JTI, our model is that we bought all our tobacco from dealers, companies like Alliance One and Universal Tobacco. We never had direct contact with our farmers,” says JTI Zambia general manager Mike Roach. Read More>

Convicted footballer who had cigar stubbed on eye by Joey Barton blames attack for downward spiral

A former footballer who had a cigar stubbed out on his eye by Joey Barton has been spared jail.

Ex-Man City player Jamie Tandy, 31, was given a suspended 18-month jail term after admitting assaulting his girlfiend.

He assaulted his partner Lisa Stewart, throttling and punching her in the face, along with throwing a mobile phone in her eye.

At a previous hearing at Manchester Crown Court, Tandy blamed his downward spiral on former teammate Barton, who stubbed a cigar out in his eye at Manchester City’s Christmas party in 2004.

The well-publicised incident resulted in “exceptionally talented” Tandy “being cast aside”, his lawyer claimed last December.

Joey Barton during his time at Queens Park Rangers. Photo: John Walton/PA Wire.

Darren Prescott, representing Tandy, told the court his client’s career went into freefall and he was eventually released from the Premier League giants and battled booze and gambling addictions.

He said Tandy lost his home and twice tried to commit suicide as he faced debts of up to £30,000. Read More>

Mary Landrieu lobbies for Jazz Fest

In her new role as a lobbyist, former senator Mary Landrieu of Louisiana has launched a Cuba practice.

Her first order of business?

Working with the New Orleans Jazz Fest in its quest to bring 150 Cuban musicians and artists to next year’s festivities.

“I’m a huge fan of Jazz Fest and I’m thrilled to have them as a client,” Landrieu said. “New Orleans has connections to Havana that are historic. It’s a natural fit for me as a former senator from Louisiana.”

Landrieu, a Democrat who lost her reelection bid in 2014 to Republican Bill Cassidy, joined the law firm Van Ness Feldman in 2015, where she is a lobbyist and policy adviser for corporate clients, including Noble Energy and Shell Oil.

Like many Washington lobbyists, she is also looking to take advantage of the Obama administration decision this year to begin normalizing relations with Cuba after decades of tense relations with the Cold War foe and she’s starting with an issue close to her roots. Read More>

Senate to debate tobacco regulations next week

Legislation that would raise the state's legal tobacco-purchasing age to 21, ban tobacco sales in pharmacies, and regulate e-cigarettes will be debated in the Massachusetts Senate next week, according to the Senate's top Democrat.

"The next big matter before the Senate will be raising the legal age to purchase cigarettes from 18 to 21, and also do some additional regulation on e-cigarettes, I think they're called," Senate President Stanley Rosenberg told the News Service on Tuesday.

Based on eight separate tobacco bills filed by House and Senate lawmakers this session, the Joint Committee on Public Health put together a bill (S 2152) dubbed "An Act to protect youth from the health risks of tobacco and nicotine addiction" that is now before the Senate Ways and Means Committee, and is slated to hit the Senate floor in formal session on April 28.

State Sen. Jason Lewis, a Winchester Democrat who co-chairs the Public Health Committee, described the bill's three main provisions -- a three-year increase in the age for tobacco sales, a ban on sales in pharmacies, and the addition of e-cigarettes to the state's anti-smoking laws -- as "proven strategies for reducing nicotine addiction among young people." Read More>

Is It Inevitable That Big Tobacco Will Shift To Big Marijuana?

Four states and Washington, D.C., have already legalized recreational marijuana use, while medical marijuana use is currently legal (or about to become legal) in around 20 states — not to mention the many states that have decriminalized the drug. At the same time, tobacco use continues to decline and the few remaining cigarette giants can only merge with each other so many times. So is Big Tobacco destined to become Big Marijuana?

The tobacco industry, for all its feigned ignorance about the health hazards of its products, is not stupid and has been thinking about dabbling in marijuana since at least the 1960s.

“We are in the business of relaxing people who are tense and providing a pick up for people who are bored or depressed. The human needs that our product fills will not go away,” reads an internal Philip Morris memo from 1970, making the argument that pot could be hazardous, not to the moral fabric of America, but to the tobacco industry’s bottom line. “Thus, the only real threat to our business is that society will find other means of satisfying these needs.”

In the decades since, we’ve seen tobacco use plummet in the U.S., with fewer than 20% of adults smoking cigarettes — though smoking is still the leading preventable cause of death, according to the Surgeon General. Read More>

Tobacco Deliveries Increase By 98%

The tobacco Industry and Marketing Board (TIMB) yesterday said flue-cured tobacco deliveries for the first 13 days have increased by 98 percent this season compared to the same period last year, while sales are up by 124 percent.

By April 19th ot this year, some 14.5 million kg of tobacco had gone under the hammer fetching $36.5 million for farmers compared to 7.2 million kg valued at $16.2 million sold for the same period last year.

The golden leaf was sold for an average price of $2.53/kg, 13 percent more than $2.23/kg recorded for the same period last year.

Of the total deliveries, total auction sales stood at 3.8 million kg valued at $7.2 million, while contracts sales were 10.6 kg at about $29.2 million.

Refected bales in the week stood at 7.5 percent of the total 47 percent down from the 14.3 percent rejected prior comparable period. Total bales laid stood at 191 274 up 107.2 percent from the 107 719 recorded for the same period last year.

Bales sold were up 64.2 percent from 92 281 to 176 910 during the week under review, as the highest price for the week was 21 percent lower than the $6.25 recorded prior year at $5.60.

The lowest price offered for the leaf remained flat at $0.10 with the weight of the average bale up three percent to 82kg from 79kg. Read More>

Arnold Schwarzenegger puffs on a cigar from behind the wheel of a military cargo truck

He is known for his action man roles in countless films including Predator, Conan The Barbarian and The Terminator series of films.

And Arnold Schwarzenegger proved that it isn't all an act.

The 68-year-old actor looked every bit the tough guy from behind the wheel of a large military cargo truck in Los Angeles on Monday.

As if driving around in a desert off-road vehicle was not cool enough, Arnie could be seen puffing on a cigar.

Action man: Arnold Schwarzenegger was spotted driving around Los Angeles on Monday Read More>

Senate to take up new tobacco regs

Legislation that would raise the state's legal tobacco purchasing age to 21, ban tobacco sales in pharmacies and regulate e-cigarettes will be debated in the Massachusetts Senate next week, according to the Senate's top Democrat.

"The next big matter before the Senate will be raising the legal age to purchase cigarettes from 18 to 21, and also do some additional regulation on e-cigarettes, I think they're called," Senate President Stanley Rosenberg told the News Service Tuesday.

Based on eight separate tobacco bills filed by House and Senate lawmakers this session, the Joint Committee on Public Health put together a bill (S 2152) dubbed "An Act to protect youth from the health risks of tobacco and nicotine addiction" that is now before the Senate Ways and Means Committee and slated to hit the Senate floor in formal session on April 28.

Sen. Jason Lewis, a Winchester Democrat who co-chairs the Public Health Committee, described the bill's three main provisions -- a three-year increase in the age for tobacco sales, a ban on sales in pharmacies and the addition of e-cigarettes to the state's anti-smoking laws -- as "proven strategies for reducing nicotine addiction among young people. Read More>

Taxing tobacco and the new vision for financing development

As part of the 2016 World Bank Group-International Monetary Fund Spring Meetings held this past week in Washington, D.C., a fascinating panel discussion, A New Vision for Financing Development, took place on Sunday, April 17. Moderated by Michelle Fleury, BBC's New York business correspondent, it included World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim,  Bill Gates, Justine Greening (UK Secretary of State for International Development),Raghuram Rajan (Governor of the Reserve Bank of India), and Seth Terkper (Minister for Finance and Economic Planning of Ghana).

The panel was in consensus about the current challenging economic and social environment facing the world as a whole.  That environment includes low rates of economic growth across the world, drastic reductions in the price of commodities that are impacting negatively low-and middle-income countries, rising inequality, frequent natural disasters and pandemics, increased number of displaced populations and refugees due to conflict and violence spilling across national borders and continents, and the ambitious United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, which includes a set of 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). A question debated in the panel was, Where will the resources be found to address these challenges? This question is critical under the current scenario if countries are to continue to build on the progress achieved over the last decade and maintain previous gains.

Gates noted that new and innovative tools are required alongside the promotion, adoption, and adaptation of good practices to make a difference in dealing with these challenges. Terkper advocated for maintaining official development assistance commitments and adopting flexible risk-sharing financial instruments by multilateral organizations to help countries attract and leverage private investment. The importance of investing in the development of healthy and productive populations as key engines of economic and social development over the medium and longer terms was stressed by Kim, who argued that many governments have to be convinced to invest in "soft sectors" — health, nutrition, and education — compared to the "hard sectors" —  roads, ports, and energy infrastructure. Read More>

Cellar Anton’s legacy inspires owner of the new Havana Phil’s Cigar Company

Last fall, a Facebook post hinted that the iconic Anton’s restaurant, also known as Cellar Anton’s, on Battleground Avenue was being torn down.

The erroneous post elicited hundreds of outcries of anguish, memories of meals past and demonization of developers for erasing a slice of Greensboro.

Finally, Phil Segal, the guy who bought the building not long after the restaurant closed in 2014, set the record straight. Anton’s was gone forever, but the building itself would live on for many decades to come in its new incarnation, Havana Phil’s Cigar Company.

Yes, Segal is Havana Phil, having assumed the moniker when he opened his first cigar store five years ago farther down Battleground Avenue, beside Lowe’s.

When he got word that the property in the triangle between Battleground Avenue and Northwood Street was on the market, he called his friend, Bob Isner, who owns Greensboro Contracting Corp., and the two went to have a look-see. Read More>

McDowell to offer growlers at Old Havana Cigar Bar

Rome’s Alcohol Control Commission approved on Monday a new beer package license for the Old Havana Cigar Bar, 327 Broad St. Owner Steven McDowell said he hopes to get his state permits lined up and be ready to start pouring 32- and 64-ounce draft beer to go within the next 30 to 60 days.

Growlers are containers that can be filled with draft beer and sealed on location, for the customer to carry out.

Just last month the ACC approved its first growler permit for Georg Hubenthal, who is opening the Foundry Growler Station at 255 N. Fifth Ave. Hubenthal still has major renovations to complete in his location at the corner of North Fifth Avenue and West Third Street.

McDowell’s Old Havana Cigar Bar already holds a beer and wine pouring license and has offered between 100 and 125 types of beers to his customers. Read More>

Wells Fargo Cigar Bar

The Cigar Bar is located on the Club Level of the Wells Fargo Center. Prior to doors opening for an event, the Cigar Bar is accessible through the P.J. Whelihans entrance on the south side of the building or via the VIP Entrance on the north side of the building. Once doors are open, members may enter the building through any entrance and access the Cigar Bar via the VIP elevators. For admission to the Cigar Bar, all guests will need to have the appropriate Club sticker or logo on the connecting event ticket or possess a guest pass for the Cigar Bar.

* Hours of operation are subject to change due to management discretion.

By becoming a member of this Premium club you will be able to enjoy the following amenities:

• Brand new LCD televisions to view all the local and national sports action
• Premium cigar menu available
• Convenient and courteous waitress service
• Top shelf bar and food menu selections from Club Level Bistros
• Personal, humidified locker. Read More>

9 Masterful Sticks for the Course

I like cigars when on the green, I like them when I play eighteen, I like to smoke them in the cart, I bring a bundle cuz I’m smart. I light one when I’m on the tee, I puff one on a long par three, a double bogey’s not so bad, I take a puff and then I’m glad.

Cigar smoking on the golf course is one of the wonderful joys in life for us lovers of leafiness. Now, people say golf is supposed to be relaxing; but go ahead and tell me that after you shank your wedge shot into that algae covered pond on the final hole of the day. To me, cigars on the course bring an amazing level of relaxation no matter how your game is going. Sometimes I honestly think my cigar is my favorite club in my bag.

When I pick out the golf cigars I’m going to bring for my day on the links, I honestly take my time and choose carefully and with a purpose. First off I ask myself is my partner or foursome avid smokers like myself, or, casual smokers, like only when they’re out for a round. The main reason I consider this is because I personally always bring enough sticks for all to enjoy. I’m a giver, guys, what can I say. So knowing their tastes for cigars is important. Read More>

Unclear if smoking ban in Meriden parks would include Hunter Golf Course

Elected officials are waiting to take a vote on a proposed ordinance to ban smoking in city-maintained recreation areas until they know for certain whether it would include Hunter Golf Club.

The ordinance, proposed by the city’s health and human services department, would prohibit the use of tobacco products — including cigarettes, pipes, cigars, chew, snuff, as well as e-cigarettes and other nicotine delivery systems — in all city-maintained parks and recreation facilities.

It was passed unanimously by members of the council’s health and human services committee, and passed with one dissenting vote in the public works and parks and recreation committee last week.

All but Deputy Council Minority Leader Walter A. Shamock voted to table the matter Monday. Shamock voted against tabling it because he opposed the ordinance at its root.

During discussion on the issue, Mayor Kevin Scarpati asked whether the ordinance would cover Hunter Golf Club, which the city owns.

“I think given the purpose behind this, I think the majority of people are in agreement with this, as am I,” he said of the proposed ordinance. “However, I had to ask the question because there is some serious concern about the golf course.” Read More>

Malawi’s Ten Oxcarts Worth of Development

Surrounded by children in the village of Chikasauka 50kms north of Lilongwe, Kamzawa, 64, tells us that he would like to be selected for the Integrated Production System – known universally as the “IPS” – to boost his tobacco farming. Using fertiliser and seed supplied by the local tobacco trading houses, and the expertise of their “leaf technicians” criss-crossing the country on their 125cc Chinese-made motorbikes, this would raise both the yield and quality of his burley leaf, and hence his income.

But his immediate problem is that he has not been selected as part of the programme. The world's tobacco market is just too small, and there are too many tobacco farmers in Malawi to accommodate everyone in the IPS. His wider problem is that government intervention in the maize market means he cannot get a commercial price for his crop and is thus condemned to a life of hard work and poverty.

Michael, and many like him, are getting smoked because Malawi is not getting its agricultural act together. Read More>

Warming Cuba ties spark Cuesta family’s hopes of recouping loss

In the 1950s, Tampa’s internationally renowned Cuesta cigar family wanted out of the tobacco industry.

They successfully sold most assets, including their Cuesta-Rey cigar brand to Tampa’s J.C. Newman Cigar Company, which still owns it today, and their factories in West Tampa and Jacksonville.

But they couldn’t find buyers for their Havana factory or their controlling stock in the El Rey del Mundo cigar company in Cuba.

Then the Cuban government took over that factory and stock through Fidel Castro’s efforts to nationalize all American-owned property for redistribution to the people of the island nation. The Cuestas received nothing in return.

 

Now, as the U.S. and Cuban governments work toward normalized relations, the Cuestas have hope they will be compensated for their loss, which has since been certified by the U.S. Foreign Claims Settlement Commission.

But the question the Cuestas and other certified claimants face is how to proceed in order to receive the fairest reparation. Read More>

Dearborn City Council approves smoking bans in parks

Call it a compromise, or just a good start. The Dearborn City Council approved a measure banning smoking in some of its parks, and limiting it in others.

On Tuesday, council members unanimously approved the change that will restrict smoking within 15 feet of the outermost edge of any play structure in a community park. That will be the rule for the city’s 20 neighborhood parks.

In the city’s miniparks, where there are Playscapes, smoking is completely banned.

Miniparks include Cherry Hill, Dearborn High, Martha-Myrtle, Tannahill, Palmer-Jerome, Riverdale and Morningside.

City leaders had been studying the issue for more than a year, trying to find an equitable solution to the problem of providing a healthy environment for children and not infringing on the rights of people who smoke. Read More>

Tobacco ban brings culture change to Rays

Rays reliever Dana Eveland went to junior college in Texas. That’s where he began chewing tobacco.

“Everybody in Texas chewed,” he said.

So does Eveland’s dad, Jim.

“My dad did my whole entire childhood,” Eveland said. “So I was always around it.”

 

But Eveland didn’t begin chewing until he attended college.

“Guys were always offering a dip. ‘Try it out. You got to try it.’ I got peer-pressured into it,” Eveland said. “Hated it the first five times I did it, and for some reason kept doing it, and I started to like it a little more, and here we are, 15 years later, whatever it is.”

On Tuesday, the Rays begin a three-game series in Boston, one of four major league cities to ban smokeless tobacco. The others are New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco. The road trip continues to New York next weekend, so by law, this will be a smokeless tobacco-free trip for the team. Read More>

Devalue Kwacha to Raise Tobacco Prices

Economics and agricultural experts are urging the Reserve Bank of Malawi (RBM) devalue the kwacha during this tobacco selling season to raise up the dwindling leaf prices that has put farmers in anxiety.

Professor of economics at Chancellor College Ben Kalua said the government, through the Reserve Bank of Malawi should consider devaluing the kwacha to help tobacco farmers realise better tobacco prices.

He said the tobacco industry is the back bone of the agriculture industry therefore hurting it through unfavourable tobacco prices would further cripple the already sick economy.

Chairman of the Agriculture committee of parliament Felix Jumbe said his committee has since been granted a meeting with the Reserve Bank governor Charles Tchuka and his officials on the same issue. Read More>

A (Mostly Men’s) Club for Cigar Aficionados on Long Island

Cigar smokers don’t get much respect. In movies and television, there is no prop so directly associated with villainy as the cigar. From Gordon Gekko to Tony Montana to Yosemite Sam, whenever a character fires up a stogie, you can be pretty sure you’ve found your bad guy.

There is also the smoking-ban movement, which achieved a law in New York State in 2003 that covers all enclosed workplaces, including bars and restaurants. Then, in 2011, a New York City ordinance banned smoking at public parks, boardwalks, beaches and pedestrian plazas.

Even at home, men and their cigars are often shooed out the door to the patio, or sometimes beyond. I know one cigar smoker who is obligated to keep a distance of 20 feet from his house. Read More>

In response to Macalester’s tobacco-free policy

In this letter we aim to question the reasoning and motives behind Macalester’s recent campus-wide tobacco-free regulation, a policy made in congruence with a nationwide movement to ban smoking from college campuses. We focus on e-cigarettes as our point of contention — we believe their inclusion reveals an ulterior ideology behind this policy that is more complicated than a general concern for health. We consider three parts of the policy.

1.First we ask, “Why did Macalester go tobacco free?” This is the response provided by Macalester’s “Tobacco Free at Mac” policy webpage:

“The tobacco-free campus policy is part of the college’s commitment to creating a healthy and sustainable environment for all members of our campus community, and is designed to be positive and health directed. In addition to health benefits, benefits of a tobacco-free policy include a reduction in fire hazards and chemicals on campus, creating cleaner grounds and air that support our college sustainability efforts.” Read More>

New Davidoff Cigar Bar offers insider-program VIP cards

The first 100 early birds at the launch of Davidoff Cigar Bar’s insider program won free VIP cards made from stainless steel to reflect the chic, upscale design of the curved boutique building on the forecourt of Fashion Show mall.
The benefits include a 15 percent discount off boxed cigars, pre-sale opportunities for new cigars and priority reserved seating on the 50-seat patio.

The Las Vegas Davidoff Cigar Bar is the latest evolution of the premiere cigar brand and includes a walk-in humidor and multiple 80-inch HDTV screens and bottle service from stocking-clad cuties.

The 1,500-square-foot experience is the company’s seventh licensed boutique in Las Vegas with the Las Vegas-based Arcella father-and-son team. Read More>

Bond… James Bond

The first thing you notice when walking into Sidestreet Fine Cigars & Luxury Accessories in the Napa Riverfront Building, is the absence of a distinct cigar aroma.

It’s there, but faint, and blended with the smell of wood and leather, creating instead a calming atmosphere. Owner Shawn Dougherty, while immaculately dressed and a man of obvious style, is down to earth and unassuming.

Dougherty created Sidestreet as two businesses– a retail shop, featuring cigars and gift items, and an exclusive, private members only club. Both are extremely well thought out and executed.

Sidestreet is an homage to his grandfather, an airline pilot in the 1950s and ‘60s. “My grandfather believed in the Glory Days, when people would dress up to go out or entertain,” said Dougherty.

Growing up, Dougherty ate breakfast with this grandfather nearly every day, listening to stories from that era while Frank Sinatra, Tommy Dorsey and the Big Bands of the day played on the stereo. Read More>

Tobacco farmers stare at unsold crop worth Rs 3000 crore

Staring at a loss of crop worth of Rs 3000 crores after bidi, cigarette, gutkha producers stopped production under new norms; the apex industry bodies representing close to 4.5 lakh Gujarat’s tobacco farmer and 1.5 lakh Gujarat micro retailers selling tobacco products, came together on Friday to demand the roll back of the 85 per cent of mandatory pictorial warning rule on tobacco products.

Tobacco farmers in state claim to be staring at Rs 3000 crore of unsold crops lying at home which are in danger of being destroyed by the ensuing monsoons in Gujarat.

 

Recalling PM Modi rolling back the 12.5 per cent VAT on raw tobacco in 2007 during his stint as CM, officials from the Gujarat Tobacco Merchants Association and Ahmedabad & Vadodara Paan Bidi Vikreta Association appealed to PM Modi to take a moderate and balanced stand on the issue by quashing the 85 per cent warning rule on all tobacco products levied by the Central government since April 1.

“Around 8 years back, when Narendra Modi was CM, he had waived a VAT on raw tobacco after he heard our appeal and understood plight of tobacco farmers here.  Read More>