STMA actively develops a new generation of professional tobacco farmers.
As China’s industrialization and urbanization goes into full swing, a large number of rural workers move out of the countryside and into large cities. The majority of the tobacco farmers who end up left behind are usually older, poorly educated women – a fact that seriously hampers the sustainable development of the tobacco industry in the region. To add insult to injury, the national tobacco leaf market doesn’t have much to brag about in the last few years, with the crop growing program in several tobacco-growing areas failing to reach its targets, resulting in a deeply negative situation for the tobacco farmers, whose financial, economic, and emotional well-being under constant threat and their production falling behind.
How will the tobacco industry respond, when confronted with all manner of difficulties?
The State Tobacco Monopoly Administration (STMA) responded with a number of policies that aim to help farmers and develop professional tobacco farms. All tobacco producing areas ac-tively responded to STMA’s call and now try to explore the new policies.
The newly-created category of “professional tobacco farmers” refer to a new type of agricultural workers who run a fairly large tobacco production facility, regard tobacco production as their industry, take tobacco growing earnings as the main source of their family income, and boast some technological, operational, and management skills.
To expand, they should regard the planting of tobacco leaf as their main channel of earning income and devote considerable time and energy to tobacco production. For example, if the total annual income of a tobacco farmer’s family is RMB100,000 where planting tobacco bring in more than RMB50,000, the latter is regarded as the main business of that family.
Secondly, professional tobacco farmers should have a certain professional know-how in growing tobacco, and play an exemplary, leading role among the majority of ordinary tobacco farmers. It does not mean that professional tobacco farmers should have some kind of professional diploma, but they should have various skills required for tobacco production, be able to better implement various technical measures, and quickly embrace various innovations in the process of tobacco production.
As the main force behind the tobacco industry, the quality tobacco farmers directly affect the development of modern tobacco agriculture. With the development of science and technology used in the process of agricultural production increases, so does the demand for quality tobacco farmers. They can transform modern science and complex tobacco growing technology into a productive force to be reckoned with.
Local tobacco production hubs are also working to explore ways to develop professional tobacco farms.
First is through government support, as industrial development cannot be separated from the support of the government. Take Chenzhou city in Hunan Province as an example. In recent years, the local government of Chenzhou city formulated and issued Measures to Support the Development of Tobacco Industry, which include specific support policies such as financial support, tobacco base construction, disaster prevention and reduction, new expansion, and professional tobacco farmers to help the new development of tobacco industry and stabilize the industrial scale.
In 2021, the Jiahe government allocated more than RMB600,000 of tobacco industry devel-opment fund money to handle the obsolete facilities and solve specific difficulties in core tobacco areas. For the newly developed tobacco areas with an area of more than 200 mu (1mu=666.7km2), the tobacco tax would be returned to the township in full within three years. For the areas with high disease incidence, the subsidy for pesticide cost per mu is RMB40, and for those with more than 50 mu of wasteland intensively developed, the subsidy for ploughing per mu is RMB50.
The financial department of the local government would fully bear the high-voltage power supply expenses of 170 new curing barns this year. After the season, 20 large scale growers and science and technology demonstration households will be selected, and each will be rewarded with RMB5,000. The above measures effectively stimulated the enthusiasm of township and village groups and tobacco farmers to continue on with the tobacco industry.
The next step is training and guidance. Take Panzhou city in Guizhou province as an example. As per the distribution of agricultural industry in tobacco areas, the Panzhou Branch under STMA selected representatives of tobacco farmers with high production levels and technical implementation rates as the cultivation targets. The agency prepared targeted training materials and strength-ened tracking to ensure the effectiveness of professional tobacco farmers’ training.
The training content focused on improving comprehensive quality, production skills, and operation and management abilities. The training plan was developed according to the technical points of all steps of tobacco production and the training needs of tobacco farmers, as well as the actual production. The training covered how to make full use of the teaching resources in the industry, print and distribute the teaching programs in the area of tobacco production technology at all levels, etc., and share the materials with tobacco farmers by WeChat groups set up for tobacco stations. They have carried out training in multiple forms, both online and offline, so as to improve the coverage, scientific reliability, and effectiveness of education and training.
The final point was communication and learning as can be seen from the example of Jianshi county of Hubei province. In order to speed up the construction of professional tobacco farms, improve the production skills of tobacco farmers, and realize stable development of the burley tobacco industry, Hubei Jianshi Branch under STMA and Jingyang town government recently organized the exchange and observation activities of burley tobacco production and development, with more than 100 professional tobacco farmers participating in the activities. The assigned instructors explained the process of secondary cultivation technology of burley tobacco’s main stem, the construction of mobile curing barns, and the method of tobacco leaves air-curing in seedling greenhouses. By analyzing typical case studies of large-scale growers, they elaborated the weak links of burley tobacco production and air-curing and put forward targeted improvement measures.
Through these activities, tobacco farmers have showed that they developed a more in-depth and detailed understanding of the development process of tobacco, ecological-friendly high-quality tobacco, and applicable production technology. In the future, they will rely on science, operations, and management, new knowledge and technology to increase income, and contribute to the development of burley tobacco industry in the county.