"Tobacco output for this year is expected to be lower than last year's, with an average output of between 50 and 55 million kilogrammes for the crop," the radio reported Tobacco Industry and Marketing Board (TIMB) technical services executive Andrew Matibiri as saying.

The TIMB had earlier this year predicted a harvest of 70 million kilogrammes of the leaf, once the country's biggest earner of hard currency.

Tobacco production has been in steep decline since President Robert Mugabe's government launched a controversial programme of seizing white-owned commercial farms for redistribution to new black farmers.

In 1999, a year before the land seizures, Zimbabwe produced 250 million kilogrammes of tobacco.

Last year, production figures stood at only 74 million kilogrammes.

The leaf crop, produced mainly for export, used to provide 40 per cent of the country's foreign currency receipts.

The radio attributed the expected low yield this year to "challenges that were faced by farmers during this season such as shortages of coal and fertilisers".

Tobacco sales for this year's crop will begin in Harare on April 25, the radio said.

- Nampa-Sapa

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