The Ministry of Agriculture will enforce measures to limit areas where tobacco can be grown. Following a boom in cigar sales, farmers in the central Cibao area began planting tobacco everywhere, resulting in an overabundance of inferior quality tobacco leafs. Minister of Agriculture Am?lcar Romero said that since 1963 the government has limited the areas where tobacco can be grown and this will again be enforced. He said it is important to take measures to ensure the quality and prestige of Dominican tobacco to sustain the boom of Dominican cigars on international markets. He said that the market saturation of last year, and the significant decline in prices offered for tobacco, caused a 60% decline in plantings for this year. In 1998, the market was saturated when production soared from 500,000 quintals to 960,000 quintals. Most of the increase was of lower quality tobacco leaf. In 1997, some 100 million cigar units were produced, while last year production increased to 200 million, most destined to the US market.
