China can't get enough of Zim's tobacco
Sector recovers from 2000’s land invasions
Tobacco farmer George Square forces a dry smile across his wrinkled face. Like thousands of others at Boka Tobacco Floors in Harare, he is waiting in a long queue at the bank to get the cash he earned from selling tobacco on Monday morning. Tobacco farmers have not escaped the cash shortages in Zimbabwe. In the past, farmers were given cash on the day they made their sale. Now they must have bank accounts and comply with the many requirements of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe in order to be paid. And even then they are limited to how much money they can withdraw at one time. Square, 49, has few reasons to smile these days, except when he reflects on how far he has come since he took up tobacco farming. "I was one of the first beneficiaries of the land reform programme in 2000 and I was a pioneer. I am growing the same tobacco crop that I was growing for the white people," he said. "Things really have improved for us in this country since we gained independence and, as a result of the ...
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