No longer among the top six tobacco exporters

Zimbabwe no longer features among the world's top six exporters of tobacco.

According to January's global production figures from the US Department of Agriculture, the top six exporters are now listed as Brazil, the United States, India, Malawi, Italy and China.

Historically Zimbabwe has been the world's second largest exporter, but began to fall through the ranks three years ago following the government's controversial land reform programme.

Rodney Ambrose, a director of the Zimbabwe Tobacco Association (ZTA) told IRIN that exports had dropped from 143,487 metric tonnes in 2002 to 103,378 metric tonnes in 2003. The country has in the past accounted for 19 percent of total world exports, behind Brazil.

"Our production of unmanufactured tobacco has dropped tremendously in the past three years, from 237,000 metric tonnes in 2000 to 82,000 metric tonnes last year," Ambrose said.

According to the ZTA, the country's production is expected to slump to 60,000 metric tonnes this year.

Ambrose linked the drop in production to the loss of commercial farms growing tobacco as a result of the land reform programme. "We lost about 45,000 hectares of land under tobacco cultivation, which resulted in a loss of 150,000 metric tonnes of tobacco," he explained.

Tobacco has traditionally been the country's top foreign exchange earner.