PRODUCTION - 4 ::

LED BY INDIA, GLOBAL BLACK TEA PRODUCTION FALLS

BY P S SUNDAR

                  With leading producing countries officially announcing their output data, it is now clear that because of India’s lower production, the global black tea output in 2014 has trailed behind 2013.

“According to our compilation, the global black tea output in 2014 dropped to 2177.75 million kg (mkg) from 2184.87 mkg”, Rajesh Gupta, compiler of ‘Global Tea Digest 2014’ told me corroborating my predictions a few months ago that loss in India's production would offset gains in other countries.   He had asked me over a month back whether the global tea output would regain.

  

This was the first time in recent years that production has fallen over the previous year although the drop is only marginal at 7.12 mkg. 

India led the decline with as much as 15.61 mkg, producing 1184.80 mkg.    Here, North India lost 15 mkg to produce 943.62 mkg and South India, 0.61 mkg to produce 241.18 mkg.

Sri Lanka lost 3.42 mkg to produce 336.60 mkg.  Malawi’s production fell marginally by 0.56 mkg (production: 45.91 mkg), Bangladesh’s by 0.80 mkg (65.45 mkg), Malawi’s by 0.56 mkg (45.91 mkg) and Uganda’s by 0.25 mkg (55.34 mkg).

“On the contrary, Kenya posted a sizable increase of 12.65 mkg to produce 445.10 mkg”, Gupta said.

Black tea accounts for the largest volume among the different types of tea produced in India.    India continued to top the global black tea table in 2014 although China produced the largest volume of all kinds of tea put together.

Kenya and Sri Lanka followed India at a distance in the production of black tea.