This time we want to show you how they sort out and press tobacco to sell it to tobacco factories. Welcome to this tobacco plantation near Chilik Village, Kazakhstan.
At this plantation, they dry tobacco leaves in the sun for three to four days. They pick the tobacco leaves up early in the morning, when they are relatively soft after moist night air.
After that, they make bunches out of the tobacco leaves to dry them in the shed protecting them from wind and moist.
They store the tobacco leaves like that until sorting.
In mid September, they sort out and press tobacco to later sell it.
Tobacco sorting takes place in an enclosed space.
Both men and women participate in sorting. There is work for everyone.
These are mostly guest workers from Kyrgyzstan who grow tobacco in Kazakhstan. In December, when the tobacco they have grown is sold, they return to Kyrgyzstan to their families.
They sort out six types of tobacco. Main criteria are color and quality of the leaf. Each worker can sort out up to 60 kg of tobacco per day.
They put the leaves one on one in the same direction and press them to make stacks of tobacco from 14 to 18 kg each.
Before transporting the tobacco to the tobacco factory, the stacks are wrapped into linen.
The company accepts from 800 to 1,000 stacks of tobacco daily.
After the economic crisis, the number of tobacco farmers has decreased. Thus, in 2022, there were 4,700 farmers growing tobacco, and in 2011 there are just 200 of them left.
Each hectare of land gives the farmer from 1.7 tons to 2.5 tons of tobacco.
They deliver the tobacco to the tobacco factory all together, the farmer and his employees. They do so to eliminate calculation mistakes.
Each worker receives from 1,000 dollars to 1,500 dollars for the six months of working non-stop.
“No smoking!”, “Vehicles carrying tobacco that are not curtained are prohibited from entering the the tobacco factory”.
One of the farmers.
Preparing stacks for an inspection.
Tobacco factories are interested to purchase high quality tobacco that is why they often supply tobacco plantations with good tobacco seeds and consult their owners on agricultural equipment, harvesting, etc.
In Kazakhstan, there are six large tobacco factories which share the tobacco market of the country.
An expert is scanning tobacco leaves to identify their sort which will influence the tobacco’s purchase price.
It is important that both the farmer and his employees participated in tobacco inspection to know the price set for each stack.
They stick a bar code to each stack containing all information about its producer and date when the stack was purchased.
It is preferable that each leaf remained intact. It depends on the climate, treatment and type of the ground where tobacco has been grown.
From tobacco grown in Kazakhstan, tobacco companies make cigarettes to export them to Russia, Ukraine, the Czech Republic and Lithuania.
Another expert is going to identify the humidity level of the tobacco brought for sale.
It is going to take him about 7 minutes.
If the tobacco humidity is higher than 18%, the farmer will take the tobacco back to dry it again.
Inspected, tobacco stacks get transported to the storehouse.
Stacks are stored according to their sort.
Within just one year, Philip Morris Kazakhstan tobacco factory purchases up to 400 tons of tobacco.
Location: Chilik
via voxpopuli.kz
Do Russian cigarettes have a health warning on the pack.
Here in Australia the pack tells you that they will KILL you, that most people who smoke will get cancer. The packets will also have a picture of something horrible like a blocked artery or gangrene toes or……..
A packet will cost about $18 for 25 smokes. The governments efforts to reduce smoking make hardly any difference. People seam to just love it.
Here in Moldova we do get health warning on every cigarette package, and I believe in Russia it is also like that. Cigarettes is one of my countries main export products. Here you can get average pack for $1.5, the more expensive ones are $2-4 and the cheapest are around $0.5-1
in portugal we have a warning like that but without a picture. the cost of a packet has risen greatly in recent years and it’s now about $5-$8 a pack.
also some laws were and are being applied like forbidden to smoke in close spaces without special certified ventilation system. it does work and reduced smoking. often we see some people smoking at the door of restaurants and such because they can’t smoke inside. now law is being passed for forbidding smoking near those doors.
In Russia all packages of cigarettes say right on them in black lettering on a white background that takes up about 40% of the face of the pack “КУРЕНИЕ УБИВАЕТ” (smoking kills). Not as good as what we have here in Canada, or there in Australia (by the way, did they ever get that whole banning of any branding done down there?), but better than it used to be. Cigarettes are still FAR too cheap in the RF though. They need to make them more expensive through taxation. It would also be a great source of revenue for the State.
As an ex- smoker, I don’t care what habits people take up or what goes on behind bedroom doors, but I do resent government oversight of legaley purchased produts that invariably result in excess cost without benefit to the purchaser. Some folks in the States have taken to growing their own tobacco and if I was still smoking I’d join them.
perristalsis: In Australia it does benefit people as the extra tax goes into the health care system.
In Russia doesn’t exist a health warning information.
In Russia every year about 500.000 people die because of cigarettes only (!)
“Thus, in 2022, there were 4,700 farmers growing tobacco, and in 2011 there are just 200 of them left.” Something isn’t quite right with that.