Daraa-Homs-Sana
The areas planted with tobacco in Daraa during the current agricultural season have increased by 60 percent over the past.
The head of the Daraa Farmers Union, Muhammad al-Jundi, revealed in a statement to the SANA Economic Bulletin that 1100 dunums were planted this season, while the cultivated area amounted to 703 dunums last season, indicating that the General Tobacco Corporation established this season a support nursery to produce tobacco seedlings and distribute them to farmers who were unable to secure seedlings. And at cost.
Al-Jundi said: The General Tobacco Corporation distributes to farmers all the requirements of agricultural work, which include seeds, fungicides, insecticides, strings and bales designated to preserve the crop until it is delivered to the marketing centers, pointing out that the reality of tobacco cultivation in the governorate has been affected by the repercussions of the terrorist war on Syria, where the cultivation of the crop stopped for about 8 years, and currently it has returned. The wheel of agriculture to turn after most of the farmers settled within their homes and returned to invest their lands.
Al-Jundi indicated that the governorate of Daraa, within the framework of its support for farmers, and in a way that contributes to alleviating the costs of agricultural work, distributed quantities of diesel needed for agriculture in the amount of 50 liters per acre per month, stressing that the current season has witnessed an increase in the prices of purchasing the crop in proportion to the cost, as he set the purchase price of one kilogram Of tobacco, the first 3400 Syrian pounds, an increase of one thousand Syrian pounds over the last season.
For their part, the tobacco farmers in Daraa called on the concerned authorities to provide fertilizers in sufficient quantities and to reopen a marketing center within the governorate of Daraa with high production estimates for the current season, which would save them the burden of moving to Damascus, stressing that the General Organization provides them with some agricultural requirements, especially medicines, burlap and threads, and according to the area The licensed tobacco cultivation begins in Daraa governorate in the month of May of each year. Its cultivation areas are distributed mainly on Tell Shehab, Khirbet Qais, Al-Ajami, Al-Shajarah, Al-Muzayrib, Izraa, Qerfa, Ibta’, Al-Sanamayn and others.
In Homs governorate, farmers continue to harvest the tobacco crop for the current season, as the production for the current season is estimated at 400 tons in the villages of the western countryside of Homs on an area of 3,500 dunums of the Burley variety.
In a statement to SANA Economic Bulletin, Engineer Ahmed Mohamed, head of the Marmarita Agriculture Division, indicated that all forms of support for farmers continue to be provided, and the price of receipt from farmers has been raised, pointing out that the decrease in cultivated areas this year and the decrease in production is due to the high labor costs, the most important of which is the high cost of labor and its unavailability and high prices. Fuels, fertilizers, power outages for long periods, in addition to weather factors.
Shaaban Darwish, head of the Agricultural Association in the village of Ain al-Tineh al-Gharbiyye in the western countryside of Homs, pointed out that the high cost of fertilizers and climatic factors played a major role in reducing productivity in addition to the high cost of medicines, calling for providing the full need for fertilizers and fuel oil for farmers and adjusting the marketing price in proportion to the high production costs.
A number of farmers, including Abdullah Abdullah from the village of Ainata in the western countryside of Homs, indicated that the huge rise in production costs of fertilizers, fuels and services played a major role in the decline of the cultivated areas.
Qasim Miqdad and Saba Khairbek
SANA Economic Bulletin