Mozambique: Tobacco export revenue up 41% in 2024 to US$217.2 million

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Mozambique: Tobacco export revenue up 41% in 2024 to US$217.2 million

11:29 CAT | 26 Jun 2025

FILE - For illustration purposes only. [File photo: Rádio Moçambique]

Revenue from Mozambican tobacco exports increased by 41% in 2024, compared to the previous year, to more than €187 million, according to data from the central bank.

According to a report on the balance of payments by the Bank of Mozambique, exports of Mozambican tobacco, one of the country’s main crops, amounted to US$150.6 million (€129.8 million) in 2022 and US$154.2 million (€133 million) in 2023.

In 2024 it rose to US$217.2 million (€187.2 million), the highest value in at least five years, according to the history of the Mozambican central bank.

This growth is justified in the report by the “increase in sales volume by 63%, in a context of price stability”.

In the 2022-2023 agricultural year, Mozambique had a tobacco cultivation area of 76,850 hectares, having produced 65,856 tonnes of tobacco, a drop of 15% compared to the previous year.

For the 2023-2024 campaign, the government had previously forecast an area of 129,321 hectares and a production of 81,223 tonnes.

A report by the World Health Organization (WHO), published in 2023, stated that Mozambique had the eighth largest tobacco cultivation area in the world. With an area available and cultivated with tobacco estimated by the WHO at 91,469 hectares, Mozambique was then the third producer in the African region, after Zimbabwe (112,770 hectares) and Malawi (100,962).

Brazil, with the third largest cultivation area, 357,230 hectares, and Mozambique are the only nations in the Community of Portuguese Language Countries (CPLP) referenced in the WHO report.

The document identified the 50 countries with the largest cultivation area of this plant, once classified as medicinal and currently the target of criticism and political measures against its widespread use.

Source: Lusa