A few of the higher-nriced cic^rs are still handmade. The filler Dart 

 is blended and shaned , and wranped with binder leaves. Then it is nlaced into 

 the lower half of a mold block containing usually 20 individual molds the 

 shane and size of the finished cigar. The unner half is nlaced over the mold 

 block and held in nosition under nressure for several hours. The molded 

 bunches are taken out one at a time, and the wrapper rolled on. Wranners must 

 be the finest of the tobaccos used in cigars. of good color, and without 

 imnerfections . Each wranner leaf, which has first been cut to the right size 

 is wranned s^irallv around the ci^ar, beginning at the base, and tanered o r f 

 to f orm the head. The end of the wranner is fastened with a gum naste, or 

 similar material. 



Tn making the very finest handmade cigars, no form or mold is used. 

 These cigars arc entirelv shaned, sized, and rolled by hand, on a sneciallv 

 made board or block fitted with a knife for dinning the head and the end. A 

 high degree of skill and dexteritv is required in making uniformlv high grade 

 handmade cigars. 



Cigars are normally wranned individuallv in cellophane. A large nronor- 

 tion are now nackaged in "f ive-nack'' cellonhane-wrapned containers for handy 

 merchandising by sunermarkets , etc. however, manv are still nacked in boxes 

 of 25' s and 50' s. ^ormerlv the boxes were made exclusively of Snanish cedar 

 but now most are of fiberboard. The cigars are carefully nacked according to 

 color shade, so that each box will be uniform in color. 



About 15,500 nersons currently are emnloyed in cigar factories. Current- 

 lv over 8 billion cigars are nroduced annuallv in the Untied States and Puerto 

 Rico. (Imnorts of cigars amount to about 50 million.) Approximately 36 mil- 

 lion nounds (farm-sales weight) of domestic leaf are used annually and another 

 86 million pounds are imnorted. Prior to the embargo in February 1 Q 62, Cuba 

 was the most imnortant sunnlier. The Philinnines rank first now. 



THE MANUFACTURED TOBACCO INDUSTRY 



(Chewing tobacco, smoking tobacco, and snuff) 



At the nresent time, around 100 factories manufacture chewing and smoking 

 tobacco and snuff. Since 1918, when over 1,800 factories were onerating, this 

 branch of the industrv has steadilv declined, as consumer tastes turned to 

 cigarettes. The neak snuff nroduction was 41.1 million nounds in 1929, and 

 has declined to about 26.5 m illion nounds at nresent. 



Chewing Tobacco 



The manufacture of chewing tobacco was at a high level un to 191 S. Since 

 that year, which marked the beginning of the most ranid exnansion of the ciga- 

 rette industrv, this form of manufacture has sharply declined. Currentlv four 

 tvnes of chewing tobacco nroducts are recognized: nlug, twist , fine-cut, and 

 loose-leaf. 



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