Top tea professionals to drive industry on a 10 year plan

The National Council for Economic Development under the direction of President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga, had its inaugural meeting of the Tea Cluster comprising of 24 members at the Treasury auditorium chaired by Secretary to the Treasury and Chairman of the National Council for Economic Development (NCED) Dr. P.B. Jayasundera.

Dr. Jayasundara presented the overview of the importance of the industry by stating that tea has been identified as a national industry in the country, making a sizeable contribution to the national economy together with textile, tourism and foreign employment sectors.

Although apparels have made an impact from among the different model clusters, tea is still considered the key strategic industry as its net income is higher than the rest. In outlining the purpose and objectives of the cluster he requested the Committee to draw up a 10 year plan as to where the industry would like to pitch "Ceylon tea" in terms of production and exports.

Members of the tea industry apprised Dr. Jayasundera of the current scenario both locally and internationally emphasising particularly the obstacles faced in terms of taxes, tariff and non tariff barriers and more importantly the global excess supply over demand.

The need to increase value addition through branding was also emphasized as it would enhance the earnings. Dr. Jayasundera concluded by commending the cluster members for coming up with many issues and proposals and stated that a few more meetings would definitely help towards arriving at the desired objectives.

He added that as the cluster comprises of experts from different sectors of the tea industry, it would be the ideal forum to draw up plans for the future rather than a few people drawing up a plan for donor funded agencies to assist which invariably comes up with prohibitive conditions. Mr. Rohantha Athukorala, Executive Director, NCED was requested to co-ordinate with the tea cluster and arrange for future meetings.

The newly appointed tea cluster is co-chaired by J. Abeywickrema, Secretary, Ministry of Plantation Industries, Dr. Rohan Fernando, Chairman, Planters Association of Ceylon and Chairman, Sri Lanka Tea Board Niraj de Mel.

The rest of the members of the cluster are: Mahen Dayananda - Member CTTA and Deputy Chairman, Ceylon Chamber of Commerce

Y.G. Wijeratne - Addl. Sec (Dev)M/PI, Tikiri Kobbekaduwa - Chairman, TSHDA, H.D. Hemaratne- DG, SLTB, Dr. Ziyad Mohammed - Director, TRI, Tyaeb Akbarally - Chairman, CTTA, J.M.B.J. Bandara - Chairman, Federation of Small Holdings, Amara Dissanayake - Chairman, PTFOA, Lalith Obesekera - Member, Planters Asso., Romesh Morias - Member, CTTA, Jayantha Karunaratne - Member, TEA, Lalith Ramanayake - Member, CBA, G.D.V. Perera - Member, Planters' Asso., Dr. Sarath Samaraweera - Member, PTFOA, Bandula Jayasekera- Chairman, Tea Cluster, Edward Welikala - former Chairman, PTFOA, Ajit Goonetilleke - Chairman, TEA and TASL, Ajit Chitty - Chairman, CBA, Ms. H.P.T. Wijesuriya - Senior Economist, Agriculture, CBSL, A.R. Wickremaratne - Assistant Director, Department of National Planning.

Some of the key issues the team will address in the 10 Year Plan are sustaining the quality image of Ceylon Tea, assistance for factory modernisation, strengthening of laws to eradicate illegal sale of tea and other malpractices, increasing the rate of re-planting and seeking redress for ESC and VAT and how to fund research required to keep Sri Lanka abreast with the global beverage industry changes.

The team was also advised develop some key budget proposals that could be included for the 2006 Budget.