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With Canadian tobacco fields heading for their biggest yield in years, the RCMP says significant amounts of the raw leaf product are being sold under the table to contraband cigarette factories.

As much as a fifth of the tobacco crop can, in fact, be disposed of some years without officially accounting for it or “raising suspicions,” and there is no obvious, legal market for that excess, indicates an internal memo sent to the force’s commissioner.

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“RCMP intelligence suggests that some of this surplus is being diverted, without detection by current control mechanisms, to the illicit market and transported to illegal manufacturers in and around First Nations territories in Central Canada,” Staff-Sgt. Greg Cox, a spokesman for the force, said in an emailed response to questions about the memo.

The briefing note, obtained by the Non-smokers Rights Association under access-to-information legislation, recommends in part the force put more focus on targeting the suppliers of tobacco, cigarette papers and filters to aboriginal-run, unlicenced factories.