TOBACCO GROWING.

Press, Volume LXIV, Issue 19460, 6 November 1928, Page 12

TOBACCO GROWING.

NEW ZEALAND PROSPECTS.

Discussing an article published in New Zealand papers recently relating to the unsatisfactory position of the tobacco-growing industry in Rhodesia, Mr Ernest Bartlett (secretary of the Marlborough Tobacco-growers' Association) expressed the definite opinion to • reporter that the parlous condition of. the industry in Africa need occasion no alarm to local growers. Mr Bartlett pointed out that there was a protective tariff of 2s Id on pipe tobacco and 2s Sd on cigarette tobacco per pound in operation in New Zealand, and even if foreign growers were to make a present of their leaf to the New Zealand manufacturers local growers would still'be in the position of being able to secure a payable price. Market prospects for Dominion-grown leaf were particularly bright, and there was absolutely no cause for misapprehension on the part of growers here. The quality of the leaf already grofrn in Malborougjj had been proved to be of a very high commercial value, and there was bound to be a good demand for all that wad produced" «Wba Government, stated Mr Bart-j lett, was vary anxious to acquire a ! shipment of leaf. for dispatch to. the London market but the local demand had been so great that up to the present there had been no leaf available for the purpose. "It now remains with the growers," he added, "to* produce the goods."