Rwanda Tea Authority (Ocir-Thé) has planted extra 3,000 hectares of tea in 2009 in a move that will boost production of total made tea (dried tea) to 35,000 metric tonnes by 2012. Currently tea is grown on an estimated land of 1,200 hectares.

"Under the new tea strategy, there is an extension of the area under tea and we want to build five extra factories by 2012. This goes in line with increasing the total production of made tea,” said Anthony Butera Managing Director of Ocir-The.  

On a monthly comparison, official figures from the Gikondo-based parastatal show that tea production in March rose by 28 percent to 1.89 million kilograms (4.17 million pounds) from 1.48 million kilograms in February.

Rwanda expects production to increase by 23 percent this year to 24.6 million kilograms from 19.4 million kilograms recorded in 2008. 

In 2008, tea fetched total revenues of $45 million (Rwf25.5 billion) and now the agency targets $54 million (Rwf30.6 billion) this year.

Butera said proper agronomic practices such as timely weeding and pruning, as well as disease control will enable the success of tea, which is one of the major foreign exchange earners. 

"We want to increase production for the local farmers as well as quality for their produce where a farmer will be able to earn a net income of Rwf45 from every kilogramme that he sells,” added Butera.

About 62 percent of Rwanda’s tea is sold thought the weekly Mombasa auction market. Only 37 percent is through direct sales while the remaining one percent is collected from local sales.

Butera said the agency will have to invest $41Million (Rwf23.2 billion) in order to increase productivity and increase direct sales.

The investment is also expected to move the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) for the tea farmer from the present $250 (Rwf141,500) per annum to $900 (Rwf509,400) an envisaged in vision 2020.

Butera said a number of factors including applying the right type of fertilizers and their right doses, and obeying the plucking life cycle which ranges from seven to 14 days must be recognised in order to meet the target. 

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