A charcoal company set in the wooded countryside of East Sussex is influencing the centuries-old tradition of smoking hookah pipes.

Swift-Lite Charcoal, based in Battle, manufactures slow-burning charcoal tablets which are exported all over the world, including North Africa and the Middle East.

The tablets are gradually replacing natural charcoal, which is dirtier and harder to ignite, as the preferred method of smoking hookahs.

Swift-lite has now been given the Queen's Award for Enterprise for turning a traditional rural craft into a hugely successful export business.

In the past three years overseas sales of the tablets have risen by almost 60 per cent, largely due to a surge in demand from North Africa.

Swift-lite claims the tablets are encouraging the use of pipes in homes and hotels, away from the traditional preserve of cafs.

Hookahs are made for smoking specially prepared tobacco such as Mu-essel, a flavoured mixture of tobacco and treacle.

The pipes, originally called nargiles or argiles, are often elaborately decorated and stand up to 32in tall on a glass base filled with water.

Their origins are disputed but they became popular across the Arab world in the 17th Century and an everyday part of coffee shop culture.

Swift-lite, which employs 35 people, is based in Petley Woods, near Battle, where charcoal pits have been found dating back to the Iron Age.

In 1984 it took over a small charcoal tablet business, which made about 20,000 boxes of tablets a year, and started exporting a year later.

For about 15 years, the company targeted the incense-burning market until, about five years ago, it noticed a surge in demand from Tunisia.

The company linked the increase in demand to a resurgence in hookah smoking. This has now become one of its biggest markets.

Swift-lite, which used to sell natural charcoal to restaurants and industry, now produces only charcoal tablets and is currently shifting 1.2 million boxes a year.

Seventy-five per cent of its output is sold overseas and it has become a household name.

Managing director Steve Barnes said: "If you go to parts of the Middle East, Battle is not known for 1066 but charcoal tablets. We have become more important than William the Conqueror."

Wednesday April 21, 2004