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1、THE NEGATIVE EFFECTS OF TOBACCO CULTIVATION ON THE ENVIRONMENT AND DEVELOPMENT OF BANGLADESHRatan DebResearch Officer, Work for a Better BangladeshH# 49, R# 4/A, Dhanmondi R/A Ph: 9669781 E-mail: wbbAbstractTobacco cultivation is generally not considered an environmental issue, but we know that toba
2、cco is a threat to environment and development all over the world, due to heavy chemical input, felling of trees, and the intentional over-supply of tobacco leaf, which keeps the prices down, and the farmers in poverty. But what is the situation in Bangladesh? Does tobacco cultivation harm our envir
3、onment? What about the economic conditions of tobacco farmers? This report combines statistics with in-depth interviews. We interviewed farmers in different areas of the country where there is significant tobacco cultivation. Many of the farmers would prefer not to grow tobacco, but they have taken
4、money from the tobacco companies and fallen in debt, and for this reason they cultivate tobacco, despite the negative effects the work has on their and their familys health. Their children often cannot go to school because they help the parents cultivate tobacco.This report also shows the miserable
5、economic situation of many tobacco farmers, despite the tobacco industrys claim that tobacco growing is a source of wealth for many. The government, NGOs, and civil society should take initiative for tobacco control and encourage farmers to grow alternate crops, particularly food crops, which will a
6、lso have the beneficial effect of reducing hungry. Not only organizations working in tobacco control, but those concerned with development and environment should come together to reduce tobacco use and cultivation, for the health, environment, and economic development of our people and our country.I
7、NTRODUCTIONMost of the people in our country know that tobacco is harmful for health, though few of them know specifically what diseases are caused by tobacco smoking. A resent survey by Work for a Better Bangladesh (WBB), the Bangladesh Anti-Tobacco Alliance (BATA), and PATH Canada showed that only
8、 24% of smokers know that smoking causes heart attack. Most of the people do not know the environmental effect that is caused by tobacco; even our policymakers are not concerned about it. Tobacco is a barrier for our development. Tobacco companies often say that tobacco growing is more profitable th
9、an any other cash crops for the farmers. They also claim that they plant a large number of trees and they do other activities to improve the environment. But what are the facts? What is the situation in our country?GROWING PROCESSThe growing of tobacco goes through a hard laboring process from the t
10、ime of swing seed to taking the leaves. At first the land should be ploughed well. Then ash is used into the soil to keep it free from unwanted weeds and insects. Seeds are spread over the soil and the land is kept covered with hay or polythene to protect the seed. After two or three months plants a
11、re taken from the seedbed and planted separately in suitable land.When the plant reaches to a certain height the plant is broken down. For next five or six week the growth of that plant becomes stopped but the leaves get matured. It is a time when plants are usually attacked by the insects, so they
12、should be protected then. The total process of tobacco growing is very toil. To get the high quality only 3 or 4 leaves from the bottom of the plant is taken at a time and the leaves of the top areas that contain comparatively high rate of nicotine are taken later. Then they are obviously dried up.I
13、t is the tough period for the tobacco farmer when they dry the leaves. After picking the leaves from the field, the leaves are kept until they turn a little yellow. Then they are to be dried up by fire for at least 3 days. During this process the tobacco to be kept in a close watch, because the fire
14、 might breakout and burn the whole. Such kind of mishap often occurs. The grade of the tobacco depends on the drying process. If they are over dried and turned black, the grade in lowered and makes a poor return. So in that period the whole family has to go sleepless, spending all their time near th
15、e fire watching the leaves. It makes a health risk for the farmers family. This drying period goes on for one and a half months.Table 1: Area and production of Tobacco in BangladeshYear1997-19981998-19991999-2000Area (in acre)811057824079910Prod. (in M. tons)366552879535480Table 2: Acreage and produ
16、ction of tobacco in three districts where tobacco farming is high(Area in acres and production in M. tons)Former DistrictsArea andProduction1997-981998-991999-2000KhustiaArea prod.144807245145506720166507990ChittagongAreaprod9905051020530995480RangpurAreaprod.573202613054765188305086023970 Source: 2
17、000 Statistical Yearbook of Bangladesh, BBSTOBACCO COMPANIES CLAIM: BEHIND THE SCENEIn Bangladesh, tobacco grows mostly in the Kustia and Rangpur districts of Bangladesh. Various aspects of tobacco farming have been revealed from conversation with 35 tobacco farmers of different villages of Kustia a
18、nd Rangpur. The conversations include the painful story of the farmers: how the companies deceive them, and how a small number of people make money using them.The tobacco company BAT has built up a grower class in this region. They are BATs registered farmers. According to the farmers, the registere
19、d farmers of BAT, Dhaka Tobacco and other companies make up 10 percent of the total number of tobacco farmers. Registered farmers, especially BATs, get seed, fertilizer, pesticides etc. from the company as a loan. So they need not make any big investment at the time of farming. Later when they go to
20、 the company to sell them the product, the company takes the cost of that seed, fertilizer, insect killer etc. at a higher rate. BAT fixes an amount how much tobacco they will buy from the registered farmers. But if they need more tobacco, they meet their demand by buying from the non-registered far
21、mers for a lower price. This is how the tobacco companies (BAT & others) deceive and deprive the large portion of tobacco farmers, while they give advantage to a small number of farmers. The scene is true for the local tobacco companies as well. They take one or two months, and sometimes even a year
22、, to pay the money to the farmers.There are about 150 tobacco farmers living in the village Nayenpur, at Mirpur thana of Kustia district. Among them the number of registered farmers of various companies is only eight. All the rest have to pay with their own money to buy seed, fertilizer, pesticides
23、etc. They sell their tobacco to the broker at open market. The brokers sell to the Jotdar (depot holder) and the jotdar sell to the companies. This is why while registered farmers get 60 taka per kg, from company the other get only 20-30 taka, sometime its come down 5 taka per kg, which does not eve
24、n meet their production cost in most cases.Most of the time the registered farmers buy tobacco from the ordinary farmers and sell it to the companies. So it is seen that only a small portion of tobacco farmers get profit from tobacco farming. The greater portion of them becomes losers economically a
25、nd physically.A number of farmers are now growing corn, vegetables, sugarcane, etc. instead of tobacco. Growing corn or vegetables can be more profitable than tobacco. But most farmers do not have sufficient money to invest in their crops. If they were provided with easy loans from government banks,
26、 they would engage themselves in growing vegetables and other crops, quitting the painful task of tobacco farming. The farmers are fed up about trying to get government loans, which is a complicated process for them. That comes as an advantage for BAT and other tobacco companies, who trap the poor f
27、armers in tobacco farming by giving them loans. TOLL ON THE ENVIRONMENTLike health and economy tobacco is also harmful for our environment. Smoking is one of the main causes of indoor air pollution. In 1995, 72.5 core packets of cigarette are consumed in Bangladesh. Our children are always affected
28、by the smoking of the adult smokers here and there. There is no law in our country to protect the non-smokers and children from smoking.A large amount of wood is needed for curing tobacco. Though now a days the farmer use the hay for cure, because of the unavailability of wood. Bangladesh is in the
29、third position in the world among the countries where tobacco related deforestation occurs. Estimation shows that in Bangladesh 30.6% of total deforestation is caused by cutting trees for curing tobacco. The tree planting activities of the tobacco company is nothing but eyewash. They plant a little
30、amount of tree and advertise it broadly. BAT, a big tobacco company give the farmers epil-epil and eucalyptus trees to plant because it grow very swift and gets ready for cutting down. But he epil-epil like eucalyptus absorbs much water from the soil than any other trees. So it decreases the fertili
31、ty of the soil.Another cause of decrease of fertility of the soil is fertilizer and pesticide that is used by the farmer to grow more amount of tobacco. Tobacco needs more amounts of pesticide and fertilizer than any other cash crops. A large amount of pesticide is used during period before the seed
32、ling is transplanted to the field. This pesticide often makes tobacco farmers sick because most of the time they are not aware of the process of using pesticide. The farmer says, sometimes it causes a serious effect on their body because this pesticide is often dammed that they buy from the middlema
33、n. Farmer buys the banned agro-chemicals from the brokers, as those chemicals are cheap in price.Table 3: Forest Area of BangladeshYear1995-961996-97Area (sq. km)21912.7921656.78Table 4: District-wise (former) forest area of Bangladesh in which tobacco growing is highDistrict1995-961996-97Rangpur28.
34、75 km27.77 kmChittagong4924.03 km2730.05 kmSource: 2000 Statistical Yearbook of Bangladesh, BBSTable 5: Rates of deforestationCountryMean annual tobacco prod.(000 tons)Total Annual wood consumption(000 tons)Total annual deforestation(hectors)% Of total tobacco related deforestationSouth Korea85.5272
35、.213.045.0Uruguay1.47.60.440.6Bangladesh55.0128.09.030.6Source: Tobacco ControlIn addition, many tobacco farmers suffer from Green Tobacco Sickness, and other health problems caused by the handling of tobacco leaves, which exposes farmers to nicotine.CONCLUSIONTobacco has never been a friend to the
36、smoker. Although the companies like to paint a picture of the farmers and companies as one big happy family, this picture is a myth. The reality is that the economic interests of the companies and tobacco farmers are not the same. If the government give loan to the farmers without any complexity mos
37、t of the farmers will grow alternate crops rather than tobacco. And if that occurs, there will be a tremendous improvement to our environment and development. We hope the people who are working on the environment and development realize the fact and government takes the initiative to support farmers in switching from tobacco to other crops.References:1. 2000 Statistical Yearbook of Bangladesh, BBS2. Golden Leaf Barren Harvest 3. Helmut J Geist, Global assessment of deforestation related to tobacco farming, Tobacco Control 1999, Vol 8 No1