These are interesting times in which to be a tobacco farmer. Less than five years ago, the federal government ended the price-support and subsidy system that had set the boundaries within which the entire economy of tobacco farming, for better and for worse, had operated for nearly fifty years. Now, with the number of smokers expected to decrease as a result of a recent increase in tobacco-product taxes, and tobacco companies adjusting their purchasing from growers accordingly--well, let's just say that's another reason why there's never a dull moment for American tobacco farmers. And with global climate change likely to fundamentally change growing patterns--and a long, chaotic, unpredictable transition to those new patterns ahead of us (hopefully not too chaotic)--well, boring times aren't likely to come in the foreseeable future.
Tobacco grows easily and yet, paradoxically, is a tough plant to grow. Of the three major kinds of cigar tobacco, for example, only two (binders and wrappers) grow well in the United States. Tobacco likes moist soil without a lot of rain (which is sort of like enjoying hamburgers, but preferring to avoid meat when possible); it absolutely needs warm temperatures (frost can kill it) but can easily get baked if left out on a too-hot day; it wants things between 68 and 73 degrees, with a certain fixed relative humidity. (That's why you've got to be so careful in setting your humidor to just the right conditions.) Since, unlike tomatoes or corn, it's not something you can just drag to the farmer's market with you and get a decent price on by trading directly with the buyer, tobacco farmers have to think carefully about raising a large crop as efficiently as possible. If you have one plot and you grow great tomatoes, you can make a few bucks selling them to neighbors; the only likely buyer of your tobacco crop is a tobacco company of some kind, and it doesn't make as much sense to go small. But these large fields also mean larger labor, storage, and materials costs. These are just the basic problems any US tobacco farmer has to deal with, no matter what the political, cultural or literal climate.
In addition, the whole field (no pun intended) has changed since 2004. In that year, subsidies first imposed by the Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1938 were repealed. This law had set a price-support and quota system to manage the amount of tobacco grown in the United States (and make sure farmers could command a livable wage for growing it, given that the Great Depression had just wiped thousands of farmers out). It punished any tobacco buyers that chose to work with farms not participating in the system, and brought stability to an industry that had been through some chaotic times. It also, however, made it unprofitable for new farmers to enter the arena of tobacco growing, and it effectively cut certain states out of the tobacco game entirely.
In 2004, the government bought out all existing quotas from farmers who still owned them, with funds kicked in by tobacco companies. Many farmers then chose to retire (some of these folks were the children of those original Great Depression tobacco farmers and were just reaching retirement age themselves). This meant a big drop in tobacco acreage the following year. People publicly expressed fears (or hopes) that tobacco farming in the US would die entirely, and cigarette makers wondered if there'd be any US farmers left to buy from.
But the system began to sort itself out again. In 2007 reports surfaced that many farmers from traditionally non-tobacco-growing states had begun to make the stuff again, since they didn't have to buy a quota from some farmer who already had one, or compete against price-supported farmers from other places. This meant the return of tobacco growing to the farms of southern Illinois, for example, from which it had been gone for decades. Overall acreage inched upward, until it was almost within 50,000 acres of 2004 figures. North Carolina, a historically tobacco-producing state, exemplified this trend; after an all-time low of 123,000 acres devoted to tobacco just after the buyout, it was up to 164,000 a few years later.
A happy ending? An uncertain future, more like. SCHIP-related increases in the tobacco tax, which kicked in April 1, 2009, raise the question of how long this upward trend in tobacco acreage will continue. Tobacco companies are already decreasing their orders from farmers, expecting decreases in revenue from smokers quitting (or at least cutting back). And long-term, no one is really sure what environmental changes will do to US farming and land use--except make things a lot less predictable for a very long time. What it means, in the short term, is simply that the climate is stranger, more extreme, and harder to predict. More sixty-five degree January days in Michigan, more May ice storms, and wilder, more violent hurricanes. With a plant as sensitive to extreme temperatures as tobacco--well, that's not exactly good news. Let's hope American tobacco farmers are ready for adjustments that will make the 2004 quota buyout look like the tiniest of hiccups.
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