Crests and troughs

Calcutta, Nov. 11: September seems to have brought a mixed cuppa for the Indian tea industry — while production has increased to 117 million kg from 109.27 million kg in the same month last year, exports have been the lowest compared with other tea producing nations of the world.

Tea exports for September are down to 17.4 million kg from 20.5 million kg in 2005.

“We are trying to catch up on exports. Despite the drought like conditions in north India, we have managed to retain volumes of 131.5 million kg from January to September against 131.1 million kg for the same period last year,” said Tea Board chairman Basudeb Banerjee.

Though domestic tea prices have been rising, the average (January to October) unit price for exports has gone down from Rs 94.85 per kg in 2005 to Rs 88.31 per kg this year. This has dragged down the total value of tea exports from Rs 1243.85 crore in 2005 to Rs 1161.7 crore this year.

While production in Assam was significantly higher in September — from 59.6 million kg last year to 68.9 million kg this year, in Bengal production marginally dropped to 25.6 million kg this year from 27.6 million kg last year.

While tea exports are just about managing to maintain last year’s volumes, imports in the first ten months of this year have gone up to 16.79 million kg from 12.55 million kg in the same period last year. Imports have been significantly higher between April and September.

At 934.86 million kg, China is now the largest producer of tea followed by India with 927.98 million kg. The other leading tea producers are Sri Lanka (317.2 million kg) and Kenya (328.58 million kg).