Tobacco Cultivation

Horowhenua Chronicle, 24 December 1915, Page 3

Tobacco Cultivation

The cultivation oi ' the tobu-cco plant in Groat Britain and Ireland is <1 growing industry—in two senses. .Five years ago lit was practical!,)' non-existent. To-day there are plantations at Motlnvoid, in Norfolk; ijyI fleet, in Surrey; Fleet, in Hampshire, and elsewhere. The planters contribute annually to the revenue in excise duties about £20,000. and large numbot.s of'wumen and girls have recently been employed in garnering this year's harvest, which j by the way, is a record one. The female workers on the 'plantations are all garbed alike in ~a dress specially designed to prevent damage to the tender growing planls. The dress consists of a loose blouse and a short skirt woni over a pair of kneebreeches. The girls are a happy, healthy lot. and most of tTieiir:Vre by no means averse from enjoying an occasional after-dinner cigarette made from tobacco grown on the estate. About 12001b to the acre is esteemed a good average crop, bulT"biie of the Irish plantations has produced 22-1011) per statute acre, which is a world's record. It is only quite recently tliat permission. under rigd restrictions, has been granted to grow tobacco in the British Isles, but its illicit cultivation used to be extensively carried on during the pro-rail road days in many odd, out-of-the-way nooks and corners. British tobacco, contrary to wlrit might perhaps be expected, is good tobacro. It is being shipped to places Sv) far away as China : while fastidfo is Amerienns ire spaying nig prices fo" it. preferring it to t'lieir own.