Tobacco growers slam closure of leaf purchase centres in Swabi

SWABI: The tobacco growers in Yar Hussain area have condemned the closure of several leaf purchase centres in the Razaar tehsil and vowed to launch a campaign to protest the ‘economic murder’ of farmers in Swabi district.

Speaking at a meeting at Tael Banda on Sunday, the tobacco growers, including lawyers Wazir Muhammad, Farmanullah, Saadullah Khan and Muhammad Ashfaq, Afandyar, Kamil Khan, Ahmed Ali Khan, Tariq Anwar, Noor Din Khan and others said that the multinational company, Philip Morris International (PMI) Pakistan, had closed down several depots of tobacco leaf purchase in the area and planned to buy the produce through brokers and agents.

They said the plan to buy the tobacco produce indirectly was tantamount to exploiting the growers by shifting huge profit to middlemen and agents and depriving the poor farmers of their just earnings from this lone cash crop. They vowed that interest of the farmers would be protected and exploitative tactics of the companies would be resisted at all costs.

A large number of farmers, tenants and workers associated with the tobacco depots in the area attended the meeting.The speakers said the Philip Morris Pakistan had shut down several depots in Yar Hussain, Yaqoobi, Maira, Lahor, Ambar and Charbagh in Swabi district, Marhati in Nowshera, Shergarh and Katlang in Mardan, Mandani and Sardheri in Charsadda and several centres in Buner and Mansehra districts and abandoned the practice of direct purchase of the tobacco produce from the growers.

“The closure of depots has rendered thousands of skilled and unskilled workers jobless. It has also deprived thousands of families of their hard earned income from tobacco crop,” a farmer Afandyar told the gathering.

Other speakers said that militancy and terrorism had already hit the people of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa hard and rendering thousands of employees jobless would prove a major source to contribute to the menace in the region. They also said that this year the tobacco companies had not included the farmers’ representatives in the consultative meetings routinely held to discuss the cost of production and fix demand and propose rates for the produce.

It may be mentioned here that Philip Morris had sacked 141 and Pakistan Tobacco Company (PTC) 144 employees under retrenchment policy last year.