July tea production up 7.2% YoY

Sri Lanka’s tea production for the month of July 2023 totalled 21.37 MnKgs, showing a 7.2 percent Year-on-Year (YoY) increase.

All elevations recorded increases in comparison with the corresponding period of 2022, according to Forbes & Walker Tea Brokers.

However, when compared with July 2021, the production has contracted by 18.99 percent, with a dip in output seen across all elevations.

For the January - July 2023 period, tea production totalled 155.82 MnKgs, recording an increase of 1.69 percent YoY. However, compared to 188.10 M/Kgs of January-July 2021, cumulative production in 2023 showed a decrease of 17.16 percent.

The improvement in Sri Lanka’s tea production is attributed to the usage of fertilisers, which was not made available last year due to the irrational decision made by the then President Gotabaya Rajapaksa who pushed the agriculture sector to go fully organic.