Launched in April 2016, the promotion aims at rewarding tobacco farmers with competitive rates on their dollars, while giving them an opportunity to win farm inputs and tools to support their next season’s production.

Speaking during the fourth draw of the promotion, Standard Bank’s Head of Marketing and Communication Thoko Unyolo said the bank has registered over 5,000 entries which is a demonstration that farmers have embraced the promotion.

“We are almost at the middle of the promotion. As we enter the 8th week, we at Standard Bank are pleased to start the count-down to the grand prize of a brand-new tractor worth about K16 million As we count-down to the K16 million grand prize, let me remind all tobacco growers that it’s not too late to come to us because we are the only bank currently offering a premium exchange rate for tobacco dollars,” said Unyolo.

Unyolo underscored the Bank’s commitment in supporting tobacco farmers by making them realise more from there sales.

“We would like to underscore our commitment to supporting tobacco growers to improve the quality of the leaf and deal with the problem of rejection at the markets,” she said.

She said Mlimi Alirenji Promotion is offering prizes that support production and the Bank expect good quality leaf in the 2016/2017 growing season.

“Overall, we expect this promotion to contribute to improvements in the quality of the leaf next season. Malawi still needs to invest significantly in tobacco while working on alternative complimentary exports,” Unyolo said.

The grand prize for Mlimi Alirenji promotion is a brand new tractor valued at K16 million. Other prizes that are being won every fortnight are baling jacks, hessian sacks, solar power banks for charging phones, t-shirts and caps.

To date a total of 368 tobacco farmers have won various prizes aimed to support their tobacco production.