Fast movement of green leaves: Tea Board of India's initiatives to minimize lockdown loss

STAFF REPORTER

GUWAHATI: Faced with the ongoing lockdown, the Tea Board of India has decided to take certain initiatives to ensure fast movement of tea within the system — from gardens to consumers — by reducing the turnaround time at every step.

The prime objective of the board’s initiatives is to minimize losses to be faced by the Tea industry due to the nationwide lockdown.

The Board in its latest circular said that in view of the coronavirus outbreak, tea gardens and manufacturing units have halted production for the past month.

“Activities in the garden and the production of tea in manufacturing units have started as per direction of the government in all the tea-growing regions. In view of restrictions, maintenance of social distancing norms and the fact that the industry has to function with 50 per cent of available labour force (25 per cent in Bengal) output from the gardens may fall further,” the circular stated.

In view of the present situation and circumstances, the circular said it has become necessary on the part of the Tea Board to initiate certain steps which will help minimize and prevent further loss to the industry as well as maintain sufficient cash flow in the system.

“This can only be achieved by facilitating quick movement of teas within the system; that is from the gardens to the consumers by reducing the turnaround time at every step,” the circular stated.

Since auctions are the primary mode of marketing teas, the Tea Board will initiate certain steps across all auction centres, subject to permission from respective state governments with regard of movement of teas, functioning of warehouses and others.

A tea producer pointed out that it takes five to six weeks for him to get his money back for the teas sold in auctions.

The Tea Board said there should be sufficient reduction of turnaround time with regard to arrival of teas at the warehouses for auction sale. “This will help in improving cash flow of the manufacturers and will also encourage them to offer more teas in the auction, thereby increasing healthy competition in the auction ecosystem which, in turn, will result in determination of fair price of teas,” the circular said.

Another step that the Tea Board has proposed is to facilitate faster sampling and cataloguing of teas after their arrival at the warehouses.

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