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| Sunday, 10 October 2004 |
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| News Business Features Editorial
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Cee-Tee Hills encourage smallholders to produce quality tea By Hiran H.Senewiratne Cee-Tee Hills tea factory at Beralapanathara in Urubokka in the Mathara District, is one of the few C.T.C (Cutting,Taring and Curling) tea factories in the country where it launched a major driving program to encourage smallholders to produce high quality raw tea leaf. The factory, which was owned and managed by the Southern Group of companies,situated 190 Km away from Colombo and it claims to be one of the best C.T.C factories in Asia. The factory has attracted more than 1200 smallholder in the area through their workshops,training programs and seminars by educating them to produce high quality raw leaf. This program is known as the "Randalu Program" which claims to be the only factory that has adopted a program of this nature in the area. The factory is also giving assistance to tea smallholders including fertiliser subsidy , technical knowhow, pest control methods and best cultivation practices, to promote this program. The tea that has been manufactured by the factory goes to the tea auction in Colombo and its main buyers are CIA countries and Russia. The company is doing their best to produce best quality tea for the export market to get the best prices for their tea, its Chairman Tilak Maliduwapathirana said. He said that the factory has a capacity of producing 35000 Kg of tea for a day and it always keeps on investing in the factory development and product enhancement programs. Maliduwapathirana said the main objective of the company was to give a better price for suppliers by encouraging them. He said that their scheme has attracted most of the smallholders not only in the areas but in other areas as well. However,the factory is also planning to obtain prestigious ISO 9001 and HACCP food security certification in the future. "This was the first low grown C.T.C tea factory to apply for such prestigious food security certification in the country",Chairman Maliduwapathirana said. He said that the main objective of obtaining this certification was to enter the international tea market in a big way, and also give a fair price for smallholders in the area. To produce best quality tea for the export market with the participation of smallholders. Factory Manager Ranjeeva Wijesekara said that with the introduction of the Randalu Program, new tea smallholders in other areas are also being attracted to supply tea to the factory. He said that since the factory is very selective over tea, all suppliers are very concerned with the quality. The factory has also introduced a post- harvest damage method to reduce damages. The factory officials visit small suppliers lands to educate them on problems encountered by them. |
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