Law Summary
Objectives of the Special Support Program
- To promote the self-reliance of tobacco farmers through various projects:
- Cooperative projects aimed at improving product quality, increasing productivity, ensuring market security, and boosting farmers' income.
- Livelihood projects focusing on alternative farming systems to supplement farmers' earnings.
- Agro-industrial projects encouraging farmers' involvement in management and ownership of activities such as post-harvest processing, cigarette manufacturing, and by-product utilization.
- Infrastructure projects including construction and improvement of farm-to-market roads.
Financing and Fund Remittance Mechanism
- Financial support sourced from 15% of excise taxes on locally manufactured Virginia-type cigarettes.
- Allocation of funds to beneficiary provinces is proportional to their Virginia tobacco production volume.
- Eligibility criteria for beneficiary provinces:
- Must produce an average annual yield of not less than one million kilos of Virginia leaf tobacco.
- The Department of Budget and Management (DBM), in coordination with the National Tobacco Administration (NTA), annually determines beneficiaries and their respective shares based on previous year's tobacco acceptance records.
- Funds shall be directly remitted to qualified provinces, notwithstanding any conflicting laws.
Repealing and Amending Provisions
- Any laws, legislative acts, rules, and regulations inconsistent with this Act are repealed to ensure its provisions prevail.
Effectivity of the Act
- The Act becomes effective immediately upon its approval by the President.