CARROLLTON, Ky.
- Boone County farmer Randy Rector looked in disgust at the price tag a Brite Lite Tobacco Warehouse employee had just dropped on a bundle of brown burley tobacco.
''That price,'' said Mr. Rector, slowly shaking his head, ''is not so good.''
Tobacco prices fluctuated wildly Monday - the opening day of Kentucky's tobacco market - from a record $2 a pound to $1.76, nearly 20 cents off last year's average of $1.92.
''To my recollection, it's the first time tobacco has ever brought over $2 a pound,'' said Danny McKinney, chief executive officer of the Lexington-based Burley Tobacco Growers Cooperative Association.
But prices at, near or over $2 were hard to find on the Brite Lite floor as the Monday auction started.
A price of $1.84 on some bundles had Mr. Rector and other growers concerned not just about this year's crop, but about the future prospects of burley in Kentucky.
''It gets harder every year, and it always seems like something is banging on the growers,'' said Mr. Rector, 36, a truck driver and part-time farmer who sold about 6,600 pounds Monday of burley he grew on a Belleview Bottoms farm he leases.
In addition to a proposed lawsuit settlement between the federal government and large tobacco companies that makes growers uncertain about the future of tobacco, a wet spring followed by a dry summer hurt quality and quantity this year.
''It looks better than I thought it would,'' said auctioneer Robert E. Lee of Trenton, N.C., who later used a sing-song cadence as he led tobacco company buyers along the rows and rows of burley stacked chest high on the massive Brite Lite floor.
''But we may not be seeing the best crop today, and the tobacco that comes in later may not be as good as what's on the floor right now.''
By the time burley markets close in February, Kentucky growers are expected to sell nearly 400 million pounds of burley tobacco, which is used to make cigarettes.
Tobacco officials said opening day might not be a true indicator of prices for the sales season.
''It'll take a few days for this market to settle down,'' said Allen Harman, vice president of the Burley Tobacco Growers Cooperative Association. ''We'll have a better idea of how it's going by next Monday.''
Grown on 60,000 farms
Owen County grower Bobby Towles, who grew about 135,000 pounds of tobacco this year, didn't sell any burley on Monday. Instead, he came to Carrollton to see what price the crop was bringing.
''It sounds like it's going to be tough to get the price we got last year,'' said Mr. Towles, 37, who farms full time on about 43 acres in northern Owen County.
Mr. Towles said a lower price hurts the people who depend on tobacco, grown on about 60,000 farms in Kentucky.
''You just can't make the money you make on tobacco with anything else,'' he said.
''We used to have dairy cows, but it's too hard to make much money with milk, so we mainly raise tobacco.''
Much of the talk among growers Monday was about the proposed settlement between the federal government and the big tobacco companies.
Under the settlement, which Congress may vote on next year, the companies would pay about $360 billion in return for no more state or federal lawsuits filed against them.
But as proposed, the settlement makes no mention of how growers will be included. There is talk in Congress of buying out farmers, but Mr. Rector said that won't help him.
Under a federal price support system, growers are allocated a quota, or base, on how much tobacco they can grow. The amounts are based on what the farmer has grown in the past.
But the owner of the base can lease it to somebody like Mr. Rector, who will pay the grower a portion of the per-pound price - usually about 20 to 30 cents a pound - in return for growing the tobacco and keeping the remainder of the profits.
''If there is a buyout, that's great for the person who holds the lease,'' he said. ''But people like me who lease are out of the picture.
''What are we supposed to do?''
Some leasees benefit
Kenton County farmer Warren Richardson, who grew about 40,000 pounds of burley this year, said the owners of some tobacco bases he leases let him keep all the money this year.
''Some people haven't grown for a couple of years, but they are so anxious to hold on to their bases in anticipation of a buyout they let me grow their base and keep all the money just so they could stay in the (federal) program,'' Mr. Richardson said.
The latest production forecast for burley tobacco across the eight burley producing states is 562.9 million pounds, down 2 percent from the October estimate.
Kentucky is expected to produce 399 million pounds, down 3 percent from forecasts a month ago. But the reports are better than earlier this summer, when predictions were closer to 525 million.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
