Southern tea plantations show negative growth

New Delhi, April 11: SOUTH Indian tea plantations have started to show negative growth in productivity due to ageing plantations and there is now an urgent need to undertake their rejuvenation, pruning and replantation.
“Productivity improvements through short term measures have reached saturation levels and growth rate in yields have declined to (-)0.01 per cent from 2.75 per cent a decade ago,” the United Planters Association of South India (Upasi) sources said.

They said with the government increasing development allowance to 40 per cent from 20 per cent for replantations, rejuvenation and modernisation it was an ideal time to take up programmes for augmenting production.

Though productivity of tea in South India at about 2,274 kg/ha was very high compared to other countries, with 50 per cent of the bushes being over five decades old, large scale rejuvenation pruning and replantation was required.

They said certain sections had been planted with the low yielding and uneconomical ‘China jat’ which needed to be replanted with high yielding planting material.

Gaps in plantations had also occurred due to unfavourable weather, indifferent soil conditions and root diseases. “Infilling” of these vacancies with good planting material was required for enhancing productivity of fields, but where vacancy was above 40 per cent, replanting would be more beneficial, they added. Sources said earlier pruning during hot dry weather had resulted in sun-scald injuries and canker and wood rot. The Upasi sources said rejuvenation pruning and infilling resulted in significant increase in productivity ranging from 20 to 40 per cent depending on the vacancy percentage.

After rejuvenation, pruning in a field with yield level of 2600 kg per hectare has increased the yield level to 4000 kg per hectare, they said. By undertaking interplanting with rejuvenation pruning, plant population can be increased to 13,000 plants per hectare from 9000 plants per hectare, they added.

Rejuvenation pruning and replanting, however, result in considerable interim crop loss and there was a negative impact on the overall production till the sixth and 12th year respectively.

However, at the end of 20 years, the crop gain would be 31.1 and 48.9 per cent respectively for rejuvenation pruning and replanting. But rejuvenation pruning was a costly operation and alongwith infilling would cost about Rs 80,000 per hectare and with interplanting, cost was likely to go up to Rs 1.5 lakh per hectare while replanting would cost around about Rs 2.6 lakh till completion of one year from planting, they added.

On the issue of pay-back period, they said break-even point with rejuvenation pruning and infilling was two years and in case of replanting, it was 15 years, taking crop loss into account. Rejuvenation pruning and replanting were labour intensive operations and it was essential to complete them on time for achieving the desired results.

They said workers required were almost three times in replanting as compared to rejuvenation pruning. Logically, it was ideal to replant areas which are over 10 to 20 years old, they added. Sources said with uncertain market situation, mobilising large resources was a difficult venture for most estates. (PTI)