Kenyan Drought Drives Down Tea Harvest - Off 7.4% In October YOY - Bloomberg

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Nov. 23 (Bloomberg) -- Kenya’s tea production fell 7.4 percent in October to 32.7 million kilograms (719.4 million pounds), compared with the same month a year earlier because of a drought. The country, the world’s biggest exporter of black tea, shipped 27.1 million kilograms of the leaves during the month, the Tea Board of Kenya said in an e-mailed statement today.

Kenya’s tea production between January and October declined 11 percent to 242.2 million kilograms, compared with the same period a year earlier, the board said,

“We will continue to see a decrease in production,” Peter Kegode, an independent agricultural economist, said in a phone interview from the capital, Nairobi, today. “The rains that we are now seeing will improve production of tea, but not to the levels that had been expected. Production will pick up in the second half of next year.”

“Tea output for 2009 is projected to decline to 325 million kilograms from the 345 million kilograms recorded in 2008,” Sicily Kariuki, managing director of the tea board, said in the statement on Oct. 30.

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