Wednesday, June 23 2010
Castro, Churchill and Kennedy enjoyed a puff, but Cuban cigar exports have fallen by two-thirds in three yearsRory Carroll, Latin America correspondent | guardian.co.uk
Smoking bans and recession are stubbing out Cuba's cigar industry, signalling a hostile era for a product whose mystique once captivated the likes of Winston Churchill, John F Kennedy and Fidel Castro.
The latest harvest of 22.4m leaves was 14% down on last year, according to figures published this week, continuing a decline which has seen the number of cigars produced for export plunge from 217m in 2006 to 73m last year.
"There was a reduction in planting due to limitations in resources caused by the economic crisis," reported Guerrillero, a Communist party newspaper in the tobacco-growing western province of Pinar del Rio. The amount of land devoted to tobacco fell 30% last year...story continues here
