Poor supply pushes up tea price

Dar es Salaam. Global tea price increased to $3 (roughly Sh6,800) per kilo as of May, 2018 from $2.9 (Sh5,000) in April this year, thanks to shortages of supply from Asia and Africa.

According to the Bank of Tanzania (BoT) monthly economic review for June, the supply shortages were caused by bad weather, which hit tea producers across the world.

“Increase in tea price was because of weak supply following production decline in East Africa and Asia due to bad weather conditions,” reads part of the BoT report.

Speaking to The Citizen yesterday, the Tea Board of Tanzania (TBT) director general, Mr Nicholaus Mauya, said the trend in rising prices of tea was accompanied with below 50 per cent skip of Mombasa Auction market among the country’s tea exporters.

“Since there is a tendency among tea exporters in the country to skip the Mombasa market, the rising global price is expected to encourage them to do so,” said Mr Mauya.

Major exporters of tea products have been attracted to sell tea products from Tanzania directly, instead of using Mombasa market due to the fact that direct market fetch higher prices the Mombasa market, said the Chief Executive of TBT. The same BoT report also shows that prices of tea auctioned at the Mombasa market has remained at $2.5 in the same period. According to the latest TBT data on tea market, the country has 25,800 registered tea growers, 21 registered factories, 11, 163 hectares of tea farms and two collection centres.