Adding yet another leaf to the story of improving ties between India and Pakistan, the tea associations of the two countries signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) on Tuesday to double the export of Indian tea to the neighbouring country in the next three years.
According to the MoU, India is set to export about 50 million kg of tea to Pakistan by 2015, which will see a rise of 108 per cent to the current 24 million kg. “This is the fourth delegation from the Pakistan Tea Association (PTA) to India since 1997, when the talks began. The last delegation visit was in 2007, when we agreed to import about 25 million kg to Pakistan. Now, we are confident that in the next three years, we will be able to import 50 million kg from India,” said Mohammad Hanif Janoo, chairman of PTA, who led the 13-member delegation delegation, the visit coincided with Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari’s trip and also the meeting of commerce ministers of both countries on Friday.
“We would like to push the Dooars and Assam CTC to the Pakistani market, currently a big consumer of south Indian tea,” said C S Bedi, chairman of the Indian Tea Association (ITA). Pakistan’s total tea consumption is about 225 million kg, of which 120 million kg is imports while the rest is through grey route. Pakistan is the world’s second-largest importer of tea.
“Out of the total tea coming into the country (imports as well as grey market), Kenya contributes about 135 million kg and India about 24 million kg. We are pushing the government to bring down the import duty on tea from the current 10 per cent,” Janoo added.
Sources said the all-inclusive import duty in Pakistan is 37 per cent. India was looking forward to the implementation of the most favoured nation status, which may reduce the duty. India produced about 988 million kg in 2011. The price of Kenyan tea is also a cause of concern for the Pakistani players because the bulk of tea comes from that country. “While the average price of Kenyan tea imported is $3.18 a kg, the average price of Indian tea is around $1.39 a kg. We are looking to increase the share of Indian tea and also that from north India as it forms only a minute share of the total imports,” Janoo added.
Bedi said ITA is trying to promote small and medium producers from Dooars, Terai, Assam and Darjeeling to the Pakistani market.
