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Over the next century, however, they outpaced their rivals
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Top export destinations include China (responsible for 42 percent of the countrys tobacco exports), South Africa, Belgium, United Arab Emirates, and Indonesia.[7] Economic Context The Zimbabwean Ministry of Agriculture reports that agriculture provides livelihoods to 80 percent of the countrys 15.6 million people, accounting for 14 to 18.5 percent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and 33 percent of foreign earnings.[8] Poverty in Zimbabwe is widespread, particularly in rural areas.[9] In 2011, the last year for which data is available, nearly three-quarters of the population lived below the national poverty line, and more than one in five Zimbabweans survived on less than $1.90 per day.[10] Major droughts in 2015 and 2016 reduced agricultural output and exacerbated rural poverty.[11] A cash shortage in recent years has crippled the economy, leading the Central Bank to impose limits on cash withdrawals and to introduce bond notesa form of local currencytriggering widespread fears of inflation and further economic deterioration.[12] At the start of the tobacco sales season in 2017, government officials praised tobacco farmers, calling them heroes, and projected that tobacco sales could boost Zimbabwes troubled economy.[13] However, tobacco sales and earnings in 2017 fell short of government projections, likely due to excessive rainfall.[14] Land Reform The controversial fast track land reform program, introduced in 2000 by the ruling Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF), radically altered the nature of tobacco production in the country.[15] Under the program, the government announced it would seize thousands of large-scale commercial farms owned by white farmers and redistribute plots of land to landless black Zimbabweans
