Malawi President Lazarus Chakwera warned on Wednesday that his country’s leading foreign exchange earner, tobacco, was in terminal decline and he urged a switch to high-growth crops like cannabis, which was legalized locally for some uses last year.
Chakwera made the comments during a state of the nation address in which he said tobacco was expected to earn less than $200 million in 2021, a figure roughly similar to the past two years but well below previous annual earnings that used to top $350 million.
“The inconvenient truth … is that while Malawi has come a long way by relying on tobacco as our … largest single crop contributor to our GDP, this reliance is now seriously threatened by declining demand worldwide,” Chakwera said. “Clearly we need to diversify and grow other crops like cannabis, which was legalized last year for industrial and medicinal use,” he added.