Browsing: Tea

Once upon a time in Kenya, tea and coffee were the big players, the rulers of the country’s agribusiness the top foreign exchange earners.

However with time passing the crops contribution to annual earnings kept falling, because the farmers were simply not getting paid in time. The peasants’ payment was little and delayed.

As a result, production and quality of the coffee and tea out remained poor and could not earn the country its potential income from the sector.

Now the government has set aside USD15 million to revitalize the sector. The funding is from the World Bank which is meant to compliment another USD30 million that Kenya set aside back in January.

What is to be learnt here is not just the will to revitalize the coffee and tea sectors but also the willingness to admit what the problem was in the first place, slow and low payment of …

The East Africa Tea Trade Association, the organization that runs the famed Mombasa tea auction has announced that it was postponing indefinitely the planned auction of regional teas, sending the industry into chaos.

With the suspension, 600,000 small-scale farmers and employees. of factories across the region will not be processing tea leaves unless those destined for alternative markets rather than the Mombasa auction.

The postponement comes amid reports that key buyers have failed to turn up for trade at the auction resulting in massive price drops.

“Further developments have come to light with respect to the spread of COVID-19 virus. It is due to this that the East African Tea Trade Association has taken the decision to postpone auction-12, the secondary auction of Monday 23rd and Primary auction of Tuesday 24th April,” noted a statement by Edward Mudibo, the Managing director of EATTA.

According to the figures from the auction, …