Tea industry is hurtling towards a substantive crisis position: Tea Association of India

The tea industry is hurtling towards a substantive crisis position with diminishing crop and dip in prices fetched in the month of November 2021, said Tea Association of India (TAI) on Monday.

In a media release issued by TAI it said that against 139.49 million kg and 148.99 million kg produced in the year 2019 and 2020 respectively, the estimated production in November 2021 has dropped by around 10.5% and 16% drop against 2020 and 2019 tea crop respectively.

The price fetched is gradually decreasing as against the price attained in the year 2020, TAI said.Prices have dwindled almost by Rs.15 per kg in November as compared to November 2020.


The release added that wage rise for the decade (2011-2021) for West Bengal has been 201% and the rise in Assam has been 186% for the corresponding period. The input prices like fertilizer, coal have also shown an appreciable jumpranging from 9-15% CAGR, whereas the increase in the tea prices have shown a mere 3% CAGR increase.

TAI said that the drop in crop can be attributed primarily due to the weather condition where the availability of sunshine during the day time has reduced substantially with the decreased temperature at the night and occurrence of pests such as helopeltis, looper caterpillar, red spider etc. The weather parameters recorded indicate reduction of all weather parameters except rainfall when compared to 2020.