Export crops have fared well this year - Planters’ Society President

Ramani Kangaraarachchi

The steady increase in exports of value added tea will boost the country’s export earnings, newly elected Ceylon Planters’ Society President Sanjaya Dissanayake said.

Speaking at the 74th Annual General Meeting he said there is a lot of competition from other tea producing countries.

“Sri Lanka needs to step-up new planting to remain competitive in the future. Otherwise there will be a drop in the level of production and a consequent cost increase,” Dissanayake said.

Reviewing tea production for last year, he said there was a significant increase in prices although there was a 9.1 percent drop in the crop, profits were sustained due to the consequent local and global demand.

“The Industry is now in a better state as the crop situation has corrected itself. Prices are also very satisfactory and have reached record levels.

At present the percentage of re-planting is not sufficient and the production levels are sustained by the smallholder community,” he said.

Referring to the rubber industry he said that prices of rubber have been good in recent times and almost all the production goes into local value addition.

Rubber production has increased by 5.9 percent. There was a fluctuation in the market price of all grades but crepe rubber increased by nearly 100 percent.

In rubber as in tea, replanting is lagging far behind the requirement to sustain the present level of production and sometimes the trees have been brought into bearing before they attain sufficient growth, which will compound the production problem.

Plans to grow 100,000 acres of rubber in and around Moneragala is being given every encouragement and with the fruition of these plans, all the demand for rubber can be satisfied.

Disanayake said that coconut lands also cropped well in the first half of the year but there was a steep production drop in the latter half which resulted in a 5 percent loss in crop.

Coconut estates continue to be broken-up at an alarming pace and this fragmentation will certainly affect production which is evidently diminishing every year.

“However, there is a bright future for coconut cultivation in the North and East. The soil and climatic conditions in those provinces are eminently suitable for the coconut crop,” he said.

The cesses being levied on sales of all three crops by Government are intended to be spent on replanting. The other important reason for cess levies is for the sustenance of the Research Institutes from hardier disease resistant cultivars to emanate so that the full potential of the crops and the work and potential put in towards their cultivation will be fully realised.

The industry also expect researchers to come up with planting material that will yield and perform better in poor weather conditions whichever the crop.

Speaking of marketing, he insisted the necessity for factories to achieve certification in standards such as fair trade and HACCP.

“Some factories have already attended to these matters but many more factories need to be certified,” he said.

Fertilizer has become very expensive and all producers have got into the habit of scaling down even drastically on the recommended quantities by the Research Institutes, and this is an alarming trend. It would be far better to resort to the application of site-specific fertilizer to reduce cost on this item.