Cultivation of tobacco

Production of tobacco leaf increased by 40% between 1971, during which 4.2 million tons of leaf were produced, and 1997, during which 5.9 million tons of leaf were produced.[5] According to the Food and Agriculture organization of the UN, tobacco leaf production is expected to hit 7.1 million tons by 2010. This number is a bit lower than the record high production of 1992, during which 7.5 million tons of leaf were produced.[6] The production growth was almost entirely due to increased productivity by developing nations, where production increased by 128%.[7]

During that same time period, production in developed countries actually decreased.[6] China's increase in tobacco production was the single biggest factor in the increase in world production. China's share of the world market increased from 17% in 1971 to 47% in 1997.[5] This growth can be partially explained by the existence of a high import tariff on foreign tobacco entering China. While this tariff has been reduced from 64% in 1999 to 10% in 2004,[8] it still has led to local, Chinese cigarettes being preferred over foreign cigarettes because of their lower cost.

Every year 6.7 million tons of tobacco are produced throughout the world. The top producers of tobacco are China (39.6%), India (8.3%), Brazil (7.0%) and the United States (4.6%).[9]

In the United States, as of 2014 North Carolina was the largest producer of tobacco, with around 1,800 tobacco farms employing 30,000 workers yielding in 400 million pounds of the crop annually.[10]

In the US, the decline in the number of smokers, the end of the Tobacco Transition Payment Program in 2014, and competition from growers in other countries, made tobacco farming economics more challenging as of 2015.[11]

At the peak of global tobacco production, there were 20 million rural Chinese households producing tobacco on 2.1 million hectares of land.[12] While it is the major crop for millions of Chinese farmers, growing tobacco is not as profitable as cotton or sugar cane. This is because the Chinese government sets the market price. While this price is guaranteed, it is lower than the natural market price because of the lack of market risk. To further control tobacco in their borders, China founded the State Tobacco Monopoly Administration (STMA) in 1982. STMA controls tobacco production, marketing, imports, and exports; and contributed 1.3% to national income between 1982 and 2004.[13]

In Brazil around 135,000 family farmers cite tobacco production as their main economic activity.[12] Tobacco has never exceeded 0.7% of the country's total cultivated area.[14] In the southern regions of Brazil, Virginia and Amarelinho flue-cured tobacco as well as Burley and Dark (Galpão Comum) air-cured tobacco are produced. These types of tobacco are used for cigarettes. In the northeast, darker, air-cured and sun-cured tobacco are grown. These types of tobacco are used for cigars, twists and dark-cigarettes.[14] Brazil's government has made attempts to reduce the production of tobacco but has not had a successful systematic anti-tobacco farming initiative. Brazil's government, however, provides small loans for family farms, including those that grow tobacco, through the Programa Nacional de Fortalecimento da Agricultura Familiar (PRONAF).[15]

India has 96,865 registered tobacco farmers[16] and many more who are not registered. Around 0.25% of India's cultivated land is used for tobacco production.[17] Since 1947, the Indian government has supported growth in the tobacco industry. India has seven tobacco research centers that are located in: Jeelugumilli, A.P., Kandukuru, A.P., Guntur, A.P., Kalavacherla, A.P., Hunsur, Karnataka, Vedasandur, Tamil Nadu, Dinhata, West Bengal; and Rajamundry houses the core research institute. The government has set up Tobacco Board Guntur which works to increase production, sale and exports of Indian tobacco. Guntur is also well known for its tobacco plantations. The Central Tobacco Research Institute works under the aegis of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research.[18] Tobacco crop is cultivated in an area of 0.45 M ha (0.27% of the net cultivated area) producing ≈750 M kg of tobacco leaf. India is the 2nd largest producer and exporter (in quantity terms) after China and Brazil, respectively. The production of Flue-Cured Virginia (FCV) tobacco is about 300 million kg from an area of 0.20 M ha while 450 M kg non-FCV tobacco is produced from an area of 0.25 M ha. In the global scenario, Indian tobacco accounts for 10% of the area and 9% of the total production. By virtue of the dominant role played by this commercial crop, the Indian Central Tobacco Committee (ICTC) established Central Tobacco Research Institute (CTRI) in Rajahmundry (Andhra Pradesh) in 1947. The institute was under the administrative control of ICTC, Madras from 1947 to 1965 and subsequently transferred to the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR), New Delhi. ICAR acts as a repository of information and provides consultancy on agriculture, horticulture, resource management, animal sciences, agricultural engineering, fisheries, agricultural extension, agricultural education, home science, and agricultural communication. It has the mandate to co-ordinate agricultural research and development programmes and to develop linkages at the national and international levels with related organisations to enhance the quality of life of the farming community.

The International Labour Office reported that the most child-laborers work in agriculture, which is one of the most hazardous types of work.[19] The tobacco industry houses some of these working children. There is widespread use of children on farms in the United States, Argentina, Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, Malawi and Zimbabwe.[20] While some of these children work with their families on small family-owned farms, others work on large plantations. In late 2009 reports were released by the London-based human-rights group Plan International, claiming that child labor was common on Malawi (producer of 1.8% of the world's tobacco[5]) tobacco farms. The organization interviewed 44 teens, who worked full-time on farms during the 2007-2008 growing season. The child-laborers complained of low pay, long hours as well as physical and sexual abuse by their supervisors.[21] They also reported suffering from green tobacco sickness, a form of nicotine poisoning. When wet leaves are handled, nicotine from the leaves gets absorbed in the skin and causes nausea, vomiting and dizziness. Children were exposed to 50-cigarettes worth of nicotine through direct contact with tobacco leaves. This level of nicotine in children can permanently alter brain structure and function.[19]

In 2014, Human Rights Watch released a report detailing child labor on U.S. tobacco farms. The report states 73% of the children they interviewed reported getting sick with nausea, headaches, respiratory illnesses, and skin conditions, while 66% reported symptoms consistent with acute nicotine poisoning.[22] The report states most children they interviewed worked between 10 and 12 hours per day and some children reported earning less than minimum wage with deductions by the contractor or grower for drinking water or for reasons that were not explained to them.[23]

In United States children were found to be working for twelve hours in Tobacco Fields.[24]

Families that farm tobacco often have to make the difficult decision between having their children work or go to school. Unfortunately working often beats education because tobacco farmers, especially in the developing world, cannot make enough money from their crop to survive without the cheap labor that children provide.

In December 2022, the UN special report showed that 3000 children were working in Malawi’s tobacco industry, despite last years’ abolition of an employment system accused of fostering child labor in the tobacco industry. The government of Malawi was implementing programs aimed at ending child labor and ensuring its protection.[25]

A large percent of the profits from tobacco production go to large tobacco companies rather than local tobacco farmers. Also many countries have government subsidies for tobacco farming.[26] Major tobacco companies have encouraged global tobacco production. Philip Morris, British American Tobacco and Japan Tobacco each own or lease tobacco manufacturing facilities in at least 50 countries and buy crude tobacco leaf from at least 12 more countries.[27] This encouragement, along with government subsidies has led to a glut in the tobacco market. This surplus has resulted in lower prices, which are devastating to small-scale tobacco farmers. According to the World Bank, between 1985 and 2000 the inflation-adjusted price of tobacco dropped 37%.[28]

Tobacco production requires the use of a large amount of pesticides. Tobacco companies recommend up to 16 separate applications of pesticides just in the period between planting the seeds in greenhouses and transplanting the young plants to the field.[29] Pesticide use has been worsened by the desire to produce bigger crops in less time because of the decreasing market value of tobacco. Pesticides often harm tobacco farmers because they are unaware of the health effects and the proper safety protocol for working with pesticides. These pesticides as well as fertilizers, end up in the soil, the waterway and the food chain.[30] Coupled with child labor, pesticides pose an even greater threat. Early exposure to pesticides may increase a child's lifelong cancer risk as well as harm his or her nervous and immune systems.[31]

Tobacco is often heavily fertilized.[32] Some of the mineral apatite in Florida used to produce phosphate for American tobacco crops contains uranium, radium, lead-210 and polonium-210 and radon.[33][34] The radioactive smoke from tobacco fertilized this way is deposited in lungs[35] and releases alpha radiation even if a smoker quits the habit.[35] The combination of carcinogenic tar and radiation in a sensitive organ such as lungs increases the risk of cancer. If the smoker also breathes in the asbestos fibers which commonly occur in urban and industrial environments, the risk of cancer is greatly increased.