Tuesday, February 4, 2014

Tobacco Cos using govt. officials to promote tobacco farming

Instead of discouragement, local agriculture officials are encouraging tobacco farming while attending programs of Tobacco Companies, as a result, harmful tobacco cultivation has spreading gradually, alleged locals. This case has found in Jhenaidah district which explored by a newspaper report published today, 4 February, 2014 on the Daily Karatoa.


According to the report, under the contract-farming of tobacco, farmers get agri-inputs as loan so they do not have to invest notable amount of money initially. But it is mandatory to pay the loan and the product they produced in a season to the tobacco company. On the other hand, Tobacco Companies provided a target for producing tobacco to each farmer while they sign a contract; if they fail to fulfill the target, the farmers are bound to buy tobacco leafs from non-contracted farmers with lower price and fulfill the target.

Additionally, children have been engaged in tobacco cultivation as it is very much labour intensive and the daily labour price is a bit higher which caused disruption in school going posing threat to build our next generation, says the report.
See the detail report:

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