Tea output jumps 27.6% in September

Reuters: Sri Lanka’s tea output jumped 27.6% due to good weather in September and a lower base last year, the State-run Tea Board said on Thursday. 

Production in the first nine months of the year rose 6.2% on the same period last year.

“There is a jump on month on month because last year same month production was affected by the bad weather,” Sri Lanka Tea Board Director-General S.A. Siriwardena told Reuters.

“The good weather that helped to increase the production (means that) this year we will have a better production than last year.”

Siriwardena said the country could achieve 305-310 million kilos by the end of the year.

Lower use of fertilisers, weak market prices, bad weather and a Government ban on the use of pesticides resulted in a decline in production last year.

Sri Lanka’s tea output hit a seven-year low in 2016, falling 11.1% in its third straight year of declining production.

Tea export volume dropped to a 14-year low in 2016, broker data showed. Export earnings fell 5.3% to $1.26 billion in 2016 from $1.33 billion in 2015. Sri Lanka recorded its highest earnings of $1.63 billion in 2014.