SWABI, Nov 23: The Kashthkar Coordination Council (KCC) and Anjuman-i-Kashthkaran (AK) Khyber Pakhtunkhwa have rejected the new rate of the tobacco crop and warned of launching agitation against national and multinational tobacco buying companies.

The growers' leaders aired their grievances at a meeting held here on Tuesday, which also discussed the newly approved rates by the Pakistan Tobacco Board (PTB) and its impact on the tobacco growers.

The growers said the buyers increased a meager Rs6 per kg price of tobacco apparently in a bid to comply with the tobacco marketing law MLO-487, which does not allow them to maintain the old rates and binds them to increase prices each year.

Liaqat Yusufzai, general secretary of the KCC, said they were dissatisfied with the paltry raise in tobacco price against the manifold increase in the rates of fertilizers and pesticides. “Last year the minimum price per kg was Rs98 but when the growers launched a campaign the buyers were forced to increase the rate to Rs115 per kg,” he said.

Mr Yusufzai said the tobacco growers would unanimously resist the 'exploitative' tactics of the buying companies, which he added, always strived to divide the growers and purchase Flue-cured Virginia (FCV) and White Patta tobacco from them on throwaway prices.

The KCC, which comprises six different unions of the growers, would hold a meeting with the local tobacco growers very soon to push for acceptance of their demand, said Mr Yusufzai.

The meeting also decided to discuss the price issue with the local cigarette manufacturers in the hope that they would buy their product helping the hapless growers to boycott the purchasing companies.

Last year, Mr Yusufzai said, the local cigarette manufacturers were forthcoming and this time they would come to the rescue of the growers.