Tea prices slightly drop but remain above 2-dollar mark

 

Tea prices at the weekly Mombasa auction dropped this week amid an increase in the volumes traded.

The prices however remain above the preferred two-dollar mark for the ninth week, signaling better returns for farmers.

This is as the government continues with reforms in the tea sector to improve earnings.

At this week's Mombasa auction, a kilo averaged $2.22(Sh248.20) down from $2.24 (Sh250.43) last week.

According to the East African Tea Traders Association (Eatta), the total volume traded was 328,319.00 Kilos more than last week.

A fair general demand prevailed for the 183,167 packages (12,059,786.50kilos) available for sale with 148,233 packages (9,785,907 kilos) being sold.

In the week, 19.07 per cent of the packages remained unsold.

“Egyptian Packers, Kazakhstan and other CIS nations lent more and strong support while Pakistan Packers showed strong and useful interest but at lower levels,” said EATTA managing director, Edward Mudibo said.

Yemen, other Middle Eastern countries UK, Bazaar and Russia were more active with Sudan quiet.

There were some purchases from Iran while Afghanistan were subdued. Local Packers were quite active in line with price.

Somalia lent good support at the lower end of the market.

The prices at the auction have been going up for the last two months aided by the government’s directive on the reserve price.

In July, the Ministry of Agriculture directed traders to pay a minimum reserve price for all Kenya Tea Development Agency teas at the auction following a sharp decline in prices that the government said was subjecting farmers to losses.    BY THE STAR