Research Study Presentation Macedonia- Analytica (ANA)

The country has long history and tradition of cultivating and exporting raw tobacco (90% of tobacco has been exported to the world market and the remaining 10% is used in domestic production of cigarettes)

The area under tobacco currently occupies 3.4% of total arable land and over 70% of the total area planted with industrial crops

There has been on average 33,000 registered tobacco farmers per year. This number represents around 6.6% of total households in Macedonia

Republic of Macedonia is a unique example of having dual tobacco control policies: it restricts smoking in public places in accordance with EU regulations and at the same time provides high agricultural subsidies aimed at stimulating tobacco production

Nevertheless, the data suggests that despite the increasing amount of government subsidies to tobacco farmers, the production of fermented tobacco leaf and the number of tobacco farmers has been declining in the last few years