January tea crop hit five-year low

Wednesday, 22 February 2017 00:00 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

Industry woes expected to continue in February
High Grown teas hit low point, no comparable data since 1970
But high quality seasonal teas benefit from dry, cold conditions

The woes of the tea industry continue with January crop volumes hitting the lowest point in five years with projections remaining bleak for February, tea brokers said yesterday, noting that high grown tea production was the lowest in a decade.

The Sri Lanka Tea Board, releasing tea production data for January 2017, confirmed a figure of 21.2 million kg (Mkg), which is the lowest since 2011 or a drop of 15.3%.

Dry conditions were the main reason for crop loss with higher elevations recording colder conditions. Over the past five years tea production in January ranged from 23-25 Mkg, Asia Siyaka said in its latest tea report.

“This inauspicious start for 2017 is not expected to show much recovery during February as well as most plantations have continued to experience drought conditions up to date. A fair amount of crop has been lost due to frostbite in the Nuwara Eliya district particularly during the month of January, whilst extraordinarily cold temperatures in the hill country in general had a negative impact on yields,” Lanka Commodity Brokers said.

January 2017 Tea Production has shown a decline of 3.8 Mkg when compared to the corresponding month of last year. All three elevations have recorded a negative crop with the Low Grown plantations showing a deficit of 1.9 Mkg followed by High Growns with a drop of 0.9 Mkg and Medium Growns recording a decline of 0.8 Mkg.

High Grown tea production in January this year is the lowest in recent history, Asia Siyaka said in its report. The figure of 4.540 Mkg has no comparable data going back to 1970. In 2007 however the High Grown January crop figure was 4.545 Mkg. Dry cold conditions restricted production but was ideal for the manufacture of high quality seasonal teas. This year’s quality season was one of the finest in many years and the best teas were on offer attracted strong international demand from around the world.

Low Grown production of 13.9 Mkg is a sharp 12% less than the 2016 quantity of 15.9 Mkg. The last occasion when a similarly low quantity was recorded was in 2011 when production was 13.2 Mkg.

Mid Growns declined almost 25% YoY 2016 with a figure of 2.7 Mkg compared with 3.6 in January the year before. This is the lowest since 2007.

“Mainly it is the weather; in addition to that, other factors like (poor application of) fertiliser and (Government ban on) weedicide also impacted,” Sri Lanka Tea Board Director-General S.A. Siriwardena told Reuters earlier this week.

Siriwardena did not give a forecast for 2017 and the board said it needed to study the weather pattern before forecasting 2017 tea production.

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

Tea exports dropped to a 14-year low, broker data showed.