Lockdown, along with adverse weather, has pulled down the production of tea in the country by as much as 21.55 per cent till July compared to the same months of 2019.
“Tea Board has now announced the data for July which shows that tea production in the country that month had fallen by 15.22 million kg (mkg) or 8.64 per cent over July 2019,” Rajesh Gupta, compiler of ‘Global Tea Digest’, told BusinessLine.
This marked a massive shortfall of 139.92 mkg or 21.55 per cent.
Covid impact
The decline was acute in North India where the plantations were closed for winter till February and when they resumed operations, the nationwide lockdown to fight against Covid-19 affected normal manufacture.
“North India’s production till July crashed to 390.53 mkg from 526.99 mkg in Jan-July 2019,” Gupta said.
This meant that North India accounted for as much as 136.46 mkg out the country’s total shortfall of 139.92 mkg in the seven months.
In other words, North India lost more than a quarter of its production – 25.89 per cent in this period.
All the tea producing regions in the North reported a lower output but Assam continued to top the country’s production table with 222.37 mkg – down by as much as 94.93 mkg or 29.92 per cent.
South Indian output declined marginally to 118.74 mkg from 122.20 mkg in Jan-July 2019, marking a loss of 3.46 mkg or 2.83 per cent.
Here, Tamil Nadu produced 80.77 mkg against 85.99 mkg in January-July 2019, accounting for a decline of 5.22 mkg or 6.07 per cent.
On the contrary, Kerala posted a gain of 1.28 mkg (3.80 per cent) to reach 34.93 mkg from 33.65 mkg.