Lands ministry to consider solar for drying tobacco

BY SHARON SIBINDI

THE Lands, Agriculture, Water, Climate and Rural Settlement ministry is conducting studies on the possible use of solar to cure tobacco as deforestation plagues Zimbabwe.

This emerged at a climate change awareness workshop held in Bulawayo on Friday.

In an interview on the side-lines of the workshop, climate change mitigation expert, Lawrence Mushungu said tobacco drying using firewood was one of the key drivers of deforestation.

“The Department of Climate Change, with the help and support of the Forestry Commission, for the past two weeks has been conducting a study on drivers of deforestation. Tobacco curing has become one of the key issues around it,” he said.

“But also at the same time, we are making some pilot studies around how we can use solar for drying because it’s a very serious issue which affects lives and also affects even the environment. So we are addressing that one as a country.”

Mushungu said together with the Forestry Commission and Tobacco Industry and Marketing Board, they intend to ensure the enforcement of laws that make it mandatory for tobacco farmers to plant trees.

“We have targeted journalists to explain to them what it means and implications for people on what they ought to do so that when they communicate, they can now package it. We are also considering and ensuring that we come up with a climate change package to benefit communities. But on this one we need hand-holding from the Ministry of Information and climate change journalists,” he said.

Small-scale tobacco farmers have been blamed for deforestation as most use firewood to cure their crop.

Zimbabwe loses 300 000 hectares of forests each year due to deforestation as the majority of people in the countryside use wood for fuel.