Sri Lanka’s drive to become the world’s top 100 percent organic food producer threatens its prized tea industry and has sparked fears of a broader agricultural disaster that could deal another blow to the troubled economy.
President Gotabaya Rajapaksa banned chemical fertilizers this year to kick off his organic career, but tea plantation owners predict that harvests could fail in October, with cinnamon, pepper and staples like rice also facing problems.
Master tea maker Herman Gunaratne, one of 46 experts chosen by Rajapaksa to guide the organic revolution, fears the worst.
“The ban has brought the tea industry into complete disarray,” Gunaratne said at his plantation in Ahangama, in the hills 160 kilometers (100 miles) south of Colombo.
“The consequences for the country are unimaginable.”
The 76-year-old, who grows one of the world’s most expensive teas, fears Sri Lanka’s average annual harvest of 300 million kg (660 million pounds) will be cut in half unless the government changes course. .
Sri Lanka is in the grip of a pandemic-induced economic crisis, with gross domestic product contracting more than three percent last year and the government’s hopes for a return to growth have been hit by a new wave of coronavirus. .
Fertilizers and pesticides are among a number of key imports, including vehicles and parts, that the government has halted as it fights a shortage of foreign exchange.
‘Compromised’ food safety
But tea is Sri Lanka’s largest single export, generating more than $ 1.25 billion a year, accounting for about 10 percent of the country’s export earnings.
Rajapaksa came to power in 2019 promising subsidized foreign fertilizers, but took a 180-degree turn, arguing that agricultural chemicals were poisoning people.
Gunaratne, whose Virgin White tea sells for $ 2,000 a kilo, was removed last month from the Rajapaksa Green Socioeconomy Task Force after disagreeing with the president.
He says the country’s Ceylon tea has one of the lowest chemical contents of any tea and poses no threat.
The tea harvest reached a record 160 million kilograms (352 million pounds) in the first half of 2021, thanks to good weather and old fertilizer stocks, but the harvest began to fall in July.
Sanath Gurunada, who manages organic and classic tea plantations in Ratnapura, southeast of Colombo, said that if the ban continues “the harvest will begin to collapse in October and we will see exports seriously affected in November or December.”
He told the AFP news agency that his plantation maintained an organic section for tourism but that it was not viable.
Organic tea costs 10 times more to produce and the market is limited, Gurunada added.
WA Wijewardena, a former deputy governor of the central bank and an economic analyst, called the organic project “a dream with unimaginable social, political and economic costs.”
He said Sri Lanka’s food security had been “compromised” and that without foreign exchange it is “getting worse by the day.”
Jobs at stake
Experts say the rice problem is also serious, while vegetable growers hold almost daily protests over reduced harvests and crops affected by pests.
“If we go fully organic, we will lose 50 percent of the harvest, (but) we will not get 50 percent higher prices,” Gunaratne said.
Tea plantation owners say that in addition to the loss of income, a poor harvest would cause huge unemployment, as the tea leaves are still picked by hand.
“With the collapse of tea, the jobs of three million people will be in jeopardy,” the Tea Mill Owners Association said in a statement.
Plantations Minister Ramesh Pathirana said the government hoped to provide organic compost instead of chemical fertilizers.
“Our government is committed to providing something good for the tea industry, in terms of fertilizers,” he told AFP.
Farmers say Sri Lanka’s cinnamon and pepper exports will also be affected by the organic campaign.
Sri Lanka supplies 85 percent of the world market for Ceylon cinnamon, one of the two main types of spice, according to United Nations figures.
Still, Rajapaksa remains confident of his course, saying at a recent UN summit that he was confident his organic initiative will ensure “greater food security and nutrition” for Sri Lankans.
He has called on other countries to follow Sri Lanka’s movement with the “bold steps necessary to sustainably transform the global food system.”
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