An official 18.50 a kilo, 12-15 from the factory, and a garden torn out after 20 lakh of losses
A 7-bigha tea garden in Boda, Panchagarh, paid for three or four years and then lost about 20 lakh taka: the fixed green-leaf price is 18.50 a kg, but factories paid 12-15 and cut a further 20-30 percent on top.
About twelve years ago this 45-year-old bought 7 bighas at Tepukuria in Boda upazila, Panchagarh, and planted tea alongside his work as a journalist. The garden made money for the first three or four years after it came into production. Then the green-leaf price collapsed: the district administration fixes it at 18.50 taka a kilogram, but the processing factories pay 12 to 15 and then cut a further 20 to 30 percent off each kilo on the grounds that the leaf is wet, oversized or poor, and at times growers have to hand the leaf over on credit. He put his losses over those years at about 20 lakh taka and blamed a syndicate of factory owners who expanded their own business while squeezing growers. Roughly 4 bighas of bushes had already been torn out and labourers were working on the rest, and he bathed himself in milk at the site as a public protest. Tea is a multi-year sunk investment: by the time the price turns, the money is already in the ground and the only exit is to uproot it.
Lessons
- 1.A crop only one class of buyer can process leaves the grower no pricing power: the official floor price meant nothing when factories paid less and deducted again at the gate
- 2.Tea is a multi-year sunk investment in bushes: by the time the price turns against you the money is in the ground, and the only exit is to uproot it
Published with the person's permission, without revealing who they are.
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