U.S. Flue-Cured Tobacco Situation and Outlook

Abstract

Thank you very much, it's good to be here in Pitt County with you today. I am not an advocate, I am just an analyst. I get to work with a very diverse group of people, and that is part of the enjoyment of the job. I work mostly with farmers and farm groups on policy issues, but I also get to work with health advocacy groups. And, I get to work a lot with legislators and with industries. So I tell folks that I try to make everybody a little bit uncomfortable-a little bit mad-so that no body will feel that I am biased toward any group.

I want to talk about the tobacco situation · from more of a domestic standpoint. But, you cannot do that without talking about some of the global impact, so I am going to cover some of Dan Stevens' material. I will skip through some of this fairly quickly, though, because what I would like to do is get towards the end of my presentation and talk about issues for farmers. In particular, I want to address the sort of business planning can you do under the situation of uncertainty that we have.