Tobacco Asia

66 tobaccoasia Issue 4, 2025 July / August By Stefanie Rossel Although Malawi's 2025 tobacco season opened in early April with notably lower average prices than the previous year, the overall direction is clear: with an expected 175 million kg, this year's crop will be 31% above the 133 million kg recorded at the close of the 2024 sales, which had already increased from 120.5 million kg sold in 2023. The country, one of the world's leading producers of burley, appears to have recovered from a production low of 85 million kg in 2022 and is slowly approaching the production levels seen during the early 2010s. "The market has started on a good note as buyers are offering prices well above the set floor prices per grade," says Nixon Lita, c.e.o. of the TAMA Farmers Trust, an organization in Malawi that works with farmers of all sizes to promote the sustainability of the Malawi economy. "However, 2024 closed with US$2.98/kg as average price, which is way above the prevailing prices so far this season." According to the government's annual economic report, tobacco exports surged to US$545 million in 2024, up from US$389.3 million in 2023. They continued to dwarf other critical ex- port commodities for the country: legumes, Malawi's second-largest export goods, accounted for US$81 million, compared to US$62.8 million in 2023, whereas tea exports increased from US$62.6 million in 2023 to US$68.7 million last year. The goods balance, however, deteriorated by 4.9% in 2024, the report indicates—while goods exports declined by 1.9% from US$965 million to US$946 million, goods imports in- creased by 2.8%, rising from US$3.145 billion in 2023 to US$3.234 billion in 2024, widening Malawi's trade deficit from close to US$2.2 billion in 2023 to nearly US$2.3 billion in 2024. The country needs hard currency to import foreign-made goods such as food, fertilizer, or gasoline. Constituting 57.6% of Malawi's total merchandise exports in 2024, tobacco once again exceeded the World Bank's estimate that sees historical averages at 45%. According to Global Action to End Smoking, tobacco continues to comprise 12-15% of the country's gross domestic product. With global buyer demand for burley expected to increase to 213 million kg this year, up A Bumpy Road Malawi has taken steps to diversify its economy, but various challenges are keeping tobacco at the center of its agricultural sector. Malawi's tobacco crop continued to increase over recent years, recovering from a production low in 2022. Credit: Papphase, CC3.0. Malawi Crop Diversification:

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