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Oceania - From Tobacco In Culture And History: An Encyclopedia, Vol 2, Terence Hays

Terence Hays

The earliest historical record of tobacco use in Oceania dates back from 1616 on islands off the northwest coast of New Guinea. Tobacco cultivation may have been introduced to the philippines by the Spanish as early as 1575, but it was after large-scale cultivation began to flourish in Europe in the 1590's that the use of tobacco, if not always its cultivation, rapidly spread, with introductions by the Dutch in Java in 1601 and almost immediate diffusion throughout what is now Indonesia, with Halmahera becoming a center of cultivation and export (as was Java) by 1616.