72 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
[June r, 1881. 
TOBACCO CULTIVATION IN INDIA. AND CEYLON. 
There is hardly any part of this vast country, from 
Peshiwur to Cape Comorin (or Dondra Head), in which 
tobacco i f some sort or another cannot be grown, and is 
grown for native consumption. Naturally, as with any 
other plant, some soils and climates suit it better than 
others, and at present Madras and Burma claim ihe 
reputation of producing the best leaf. There appears 
to us, however, no reason why, with proper care and 
atteu f ion in the cultivation and curing, as good to- 
baco should not be produced in Bengal, or elsewhere, 
as in tl.e two parts of the country which have already 
acquired a name for it. Nay, as a fact, it is already 
produced, and consumers of Madras and Burma che- 
roots may be surprised to hear that a good deal of 
the tobacco of which those favorite brands are made 
is first exported from. Bengal, and then returned here 
in the shape of genuine Madras or Burma cheroots. 
Spino of it also, perhaps, re-appears in the disguise of 
the genuine ITavamiah, for there is a large quantity 
of tobacco exported annually from this country to 
Germany, and a good many of the cigars sold here 
as Havannahs are manufactured in the neighbourhood 
of Berlin. The consumption of tobacco throughout 
the world increises annually in a larger ratio than the 
population, and it has long been a matter of surprise 
to us that greater efforts have not been made to in- 
crease the cultivation and improve the manufacture 
of tobacco in this country. An experiment on a mode- 
rate scale has certainly been tried by Messrs. Begg, 
Dunlop & Co. at Ghazipur and Pusa, during the last 
few years, and the results, the report of which for 
the year 1879-80 is now before us, are, we consider, 
quite sufficient to justify not only those gentlemen 
in extending their manufacture, but to induce others 
to follow their example. 
The chief operations of this firm are at Pusa, in 
the Durbhanga district of Behar, carried on under 
the supervision of European and American managers 
and curers, aud employing about four hundred Datives. 
In 1877-78 the quality of cured leaf exported was 
29,9931b., which sold at an average of about 3|d 
per pouud, an excellent average for the first year's 
curing, as it was the same average rate as that at 
which American tobacco was then selling in England. 
The French Government were also so favourably 
impressed with the samples they examined that they 
at once gave an order for forty maunds, and enquired 
to what extent the supply might be relied on. This 
seemed to promise a good optning, but the present 
proprietors do not appear inclined to extend their 
operations. In the next year they only increased the 
area of cultiva:ion by 75 acres, and the season turned 
out very wet and therefore unfavourable to the proper 
curing of the leaf. Other causes also operated to pre- 
vent an extension of the export of the produce, 
though we ehould have thought that these would 
have conduced to a more extended cultivation. We 
are told that the demand for the tobacco in the Indian 
market developed so rapidly that it was soon found 
that, with the present establishment and the present 
extent of cultivation, the firm would have for a time 
to give up any idea of competing in the European 
field; for the enterprise has not yet become sufficiently 
strong to carry on the struggle in both places. The 
insufficient quantity of the outturn during the last two 
years, the initial expenditure incurred in importing 
machinery and training up hands in the manufacturing 
processes, the greater certainty of success, ihe imrno- 
diate and higher profit expected in this branch «'f 
the industry for the capital (R 1,00,000) which the 
linn have muk— all decided tl em in favour .of con- 
fining themselves to manufacturing to meet the demand 
for local consumption. How long a lime will elapse 
before the firm again finds itself in a position to ex- 
port, it is difficult to say ; year by year the extent 
of operations is increasing, but large supplies of to- 
I bacco cannot be available for export until the Indian 
i market is thoroughly satisfied. 
Here then is a line opporl unity for others to com- 
pete, for the Indian demand is not adequately satis- 
'fied, and the foreign markets may be said to be un- 
J touched. For the benefit of any one who may feel 
inclined to engage in the enterprise we add a few lines 
as to the system of cultivation adopted, which is as 
follows : — For tobacco smne rotation of crops is practised 
and cultivators seldom sow it on the same land for 
three years together. The crop generally preferred 
to precede it is the root crop, Batatas edalis (shakar- 
kand), extensively used as food by the poorer classes 
for some months in the year, which is sown in the 
rains and dug up in the old weather. After this, 
or some other rabi crop has been taken off the field, 
the land is well dug with a hoe, and then ploughed 
twice every month. The manure used is chiefly cow- 
dung, which is thrown on the land, or cattle are 
penned on the ground. Lano 1 being thus well-ploughed 
and well -manured, is fit for planting with tobacco on 
the cessation of the rains in the month of September. 
The seed is first sown on a seed-bed from which the 
young seedlings are transplanted to the field. After 
this, it requires very little care, except a little weed- 
ing and picking off the superfluous shoots, leaving 
ten or twelve leaves on the plant. No irrigation is 
necessary ; a little water 33 only allowed for two days 
at the time of transplantation. The crop is ready 
for cutting in February or March. The yield of an 
acre is from twelve to twenty inaunds, which is gener- 
ally sold at R5 to R8 per maund. It must be 
remembered that the coarse thick leaf produced by 
natives on their field, by the excessive use of nitro- 
genous constituents, does, not answer the purposes of 
the factory. Finer leaf, with considerably less acrid 
taste, is only fit for curing purposes. The outturn 
per acre of leaf for the factory is therexoie estimated 
at 8001b. instead of 1,600 1b. (20 maunds), as in- 
the native-cultivated land. Indeed, the outturn at 
Pusa during the lasi two years did not exceed GOO lb. 
per acre, owing to the finer lebcture of leaf grown, 
and to the land not being so heavily manured with 
animal matter as the native land3. But all the leaf 
produced in a tobacco field does not give prime to- 
bacco. An acre generally produces a~bout 10,000 plants, 
of which one-fourth gives first class tobacco ; one-fourth, 
secoud class ; and the remaiuing half, third-class to- 
bacco. All these classes will give a total weight of 
about 600 lb. of marketable article. 
As to the cost we learn that the pri^e paid for 
an acre of tobacco (600 lb ) is about E40, or 15 lb. 
per rupee, or a little above one anna per lb. The 
cost of curing is very small, probably not exceeding 
more than a rupee for P 0 lb. , The cost of growing 
aud curing tobacco has thus been reduced from what 
was estimated by Mr. Buck, in his report of the 18th 
October 1876, viz., M. per lb. delivered in England, 
and it is now considered possible to deliver cured to- 
bacco in England at 3d. per lb. with even a small profit. 
We think that we have now said quite enough, 
backed up as we are by official reports, to show that 
tobacco manufacture in India ought to prove a most 
profitable investment, if properly managed. — Asian. 
The largest sale for artificial fertilizers is in the 
South Atlantic States, the lands in which have become 
impoverished by cotton and tobacco culture. 
It is e timated that the nianurial products annually 
emptied into the river Thames by the sewage of London, 
if applied to a barren soil, would impart to it a pro- 
ductive power capable of feeding 150,000 people. 
A ton of cotton seed meal contains 38 pounds of 
potash, 56 pounds of phosphoric acid, and 78 pounds 
nitrogen. A ton of average barnyard manure contains 
12 pounds of nitrogen, 6 pounds of phosphoric acid 
and 13 pounds of potash. 
