Tobacco growers of Las Tunas hope to conclude on Monday the first stage of the watering to the seedbeds.

By Raul Estrada Zamora
estrada@enet.cu
Translation: Ernesto Gutierrez Pino

Las Tunas. - The tobacco workers of Las Tunas province work quickly to end this month with the watering to the first 300 seedbed and to boost the construction of the houses for the cure, in views to the definitive recovery of that sector whose areas and facilities were razed by the

hurricane Ike last September.

If the tobacco planters concludes successfully on Monday the creation of the all the seedbeds, they could begin at the first days of October the sowing of 537 hectares for the havest 2009-2010, in which they expect to obtain 685 tons of the leaf.

Engineer Dionel Hinojosa, agricultural vice-director of the Company of Storing of Tobacco, in the province, 690 kilometers to the east of Havana, told Tiempo21 they have the necessary resources to create up to December 31 a bank of 30 hectares of seeds, however they face serious difficulties as for the wood to build the foreseen houses for the cure.

The shortage of fuel to transport the wood blocks the construction of houses for the cure of tobacco.

On this matter, the directive explained that although they have built 709 of those facilities, they still need to erect dozens to finish, due to the shortage of fuel for the transportation of the wood by railroad from the municipality of Esmeralda, in the neighboring Camaguey province.   Hinojosa stated that some 350 tobacco workers of the eight municipalities of Las Tunas will participate in the campaign and advanced that although the area to

sow will be smaller in comparison with the previous years, they hope to reach yields without precedents.

Although Las Tunas doesn't have strong tradition in this economic branch, it has helped to increase that production, one of the main exportable funds of Cuba with great prestige in the world makert.