Glyphosate ban to worsen tea industry woes

By Chandeepa Wettasinghe
The troubles of the country’s tea industry are likely to be worsened with the recently enacted presidential ban on the herbicide, glyphosate, which has had no reports of ill effects on residents across the tea plantation areas so far. 

“There is no alternative. To remove the weeds with manual labour will cost around four to five times more and it will have to be done more frequently, as it is less effective. Manual removal will also erode the soil,” Planters’ Association Chairman Roshan Rajadurei said.

Veteran tea planter Dr. Dan Seevaratnam noted that the roots of the weeds reach deep and cannot be easily found. Therefore, failing to eliminate the roots would cause little effect on the weeds, while digging extensively would harm the soil.

Relying on labour is not the answer either, as the 21 Regional Plantation Companies (RPCs), which are represented by the Planters’ Association, have reportedly been losing around Rs.2 billion annually for the past three years, due to the mandatory regular wage hikes called by the trade unions. Further, despite having the highest paid tea industry work force in the world, tea estate workers in Sri Lanka are considered the least productive globally as well.  Labour accounts for over 70 percent of tea production costs. Therefore, planters are contemplating whether to let weeds grow. “Are we going to let the weeds be and lose 5-10 percent of our revenue?” Dr. Seevaratnam asked. Both Rajadurei and Dr. Seevaratnam said that there have been no adverse effects experienced by either the residents in the tea estates or tea consumers in the 40 years since the introduction of glyphosate to the local tea industry. “There have been absolutely no ill effects. It is sprayed under strict guidelines of the Tea Research Institute (TRI) and the tea export countries are very serious about the minimum residue levels of chemicals,” Rajadurei said. 

According to the World Health Organisation, only 0.5 milligrammes of glyphosate can be present in one kilogramme of tea and the TRI has imposed a two-round spray limit annually, in order to further minimize risk.

However, Dr. Seevaratnam said that banning glyphosate in the paddy growing areas could be justified. “There may be some correlation between Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD) and glyphosate in the paddy growing areas. I’m not exactly sure,” he said.

Studies carried out through the years, both by the Sri Lankan government and international bodies, have shown no conclusive evidence that the chemical does cause CKD.

Despite the fact, in February 2014, during President Maithripala Sirisena’s tenure as the Health Minister, glyphosate distribution, sale and usage were banned in the paddy growing areas, as nearly 15 percent of the population in the North Central Province had been diagnosed with CKD. However, Dr. Seevaratnam said that the government had not followed up the action by reducing the import quotas of glyphosate in the licences of the agrochemical companies and extra supplies had reached paddy farmers in the black market. “The agrochemical companies are very responsible. But somehow, cans of glyphosate, which are Rs.4,000, are being sold at Rs.12,000-14,000 to paddy farmers, who still find it far more cost effective than manually removing the weeds,” he said. He noted that a new type of herbicide is being experimented on at the TRI but that commercial applications of the new chemical would be three to four times more expensive. Rajadurei said that there is no alternative in the short term and that the Planters’ Association has requested the government to allow the minimum amount be used in tea plantations.