Party time for tea producers (world wide tea prices going up & staying up

[ensho]

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/LA20Df03.html


Lovers of tea are going to pay more for their cup of cheer for some time to come, with a shortfall in global tea supplies anticipated to rise to nearly 140 million kilograms this year from 120 million kg in 2009.

Strong tea prices "will be a long-term trend for the next few years", said Aditya Khaitan, managing director of McLeod Russel, the world's largest tea plantation company and India's biggest tea exporter. A recent increase in tea production in Africa "is only temporary relief" and "might have an effect in prices only for a few months," he told Asia Times Online from Kolkata.

Khaitan effectively quashed any optimism, particularly from the Rome-based United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) on January 13 predicting wholesale tea prices easing in 2010. The FAO based its hopes on the climate not continuing to affect the important tea-producing regions of Asia and Africa. Tea prices have dipped by 20% this month, following rains last December in Kenya, the world's largest tea exporter, after a record price surge of 85% in 2009.

-snip-

Tea men need have no worries of getting customers for the next few years - particularly if tea production continues depending on increasingly cranky global climatic patterns, even as chai lovers and specialized tea bars multiply. Perhaps tea is sadly doomed to becoming as expensive a habit as coffee.
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everything in the world will cost more and more as there is less and less

[duphase]

1. Just another symptom of over-population. Nothing to worry about.

It's impolite to even talk about it, I know. So, I won't say anything.