Auctions of Coonoor Tea Trade Association are reopening on Thursday after remaining closed for a fortnight for Christmas and New Year celebrations. As North Indian plantations are closed for winter on Tea Board’s orders, upcountry buyers are showing interest in procuring teas from Coonoor auctions.
For the first auction of 2020, a volume of 15.70 lakh kg has been catalogued. This is some 42,000 kg more than the volume offered in the last auctions of 2019.
Of the 15.70 lakh kg offered, as much as 14.42 lakh kg belongs to CTC variety and only 1.28 lakh kg orthodox variety. The proportion of orthodox teas continues to be low in both leaf and dust grades. In the leaf counter, only 84,000 kg belongs to orthodox while 10.06 lakh kg, CTC. Among the dusts, only 44,000 kg belongs to orthodox while 4.36 lakh kg, CTC. In all, 10.90 lakh kg belongs to Leaf grades and 4.80 lakh kg, Dust grades.
Homedale Tea Factory topped the entire auction in the last sale of 2019 when its Broken Orange Pekoe grade, auctioned by Global Tea Brokers, was bought by Tanmay Tea Co for ₹292 a kg. Homedale Estate’s Super Red Dust grade, auctioned by Global Tea Brokers, topped the Dust tea auctions fetching ₹262. These two prices were more than even the price got by export-oriented orthodox teas from corporates. Pinewood Estate got ₹201. No other CTC tea could enter the high-price bracket of ₹200 a kg.
Quotations with the brokers indicated ₹60-68 a kg for plain Leaf grades and ₹114-130 for the best grades. For plain Dust grades, they ranged ₹63-72 and for the best grades, ₹118-132.