The Hindu Business Line : Tea Board, Upasi team to visit Pak in Dec

The other members of team will include Chairman and senior officials of Tea Board and representatives of tea industry, both Indian Tea Association and United Planters’ Association of South India.

Land route

The focus of the visit, Mr Ramesh, told newspersons, would be how to expedite the tea transportation to Pakistan via the land route, particularly the Atari-Wagah border.

Once the route opened up, it should be possible to boost tea export also to Afghanistan.

INFRASTRUCTURAL HURDLES

“Right now, technically there is no restriction on movement of tea by land route to Pakistan but it is not taking off because of some infrastructural problems”, he said and pointed out that on the Indian side of the border, a huge land customs station to be complete with various facilities to facilitate the trade was being set up.

Amritsar could be the key point in regard to trade with Pakistan by land route, he observed.

PRICE-SENSITIVE MARKET

For Indian tea exporters, Pakistan had always been a price-sensitive 10-million kg (mkg) market, except two years ago when India’s exports jumped to 16 mkg.

Kenya had been the single largest supplier of tea to that country, he said, hoping that this year Indian exports should rise due to the crop failure in Kenya.

Other buyers

The other countries which, as he pointed out, had emerged as major buyers were Egypt where the exports could rise to 15/20 mkg this year as compared to three-four million kg annually.

Another buyer is Iran where exports could rise to eight mkg from four mkg to five mkg and Iraq.

The payment problem in Iraq having been settled, the export to that country too could rise to 20 kg from last year’s three mkgs or so.

SPECIALITY SEGMENT

Mr Basudeb Banerjee, Chairman of Tea Board, said a move was afoot to concentrate on the speciality tea segment of the US market, where supplies of black tea were being taken care of by Argentina and China.

Slowdown impact

The impact of the global slowdown on India’s exports, Mr Ramesh said, was yet to be assessed fully. “May be the impact will be felt more next year”, he observed pointing out that this year total net exports of tea this should 210 mkg and, in the worst of situation, 200 mkg as against 189 mkg last year.

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