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Increasing tea smallholdings productivity/efficiency: Knowledge-sharing platforms based on experience, vital 

04 Feb 2021

  • TRISL recommends cultivars from certified plant nurseries, intercropping  

  There is a need to provide platforms for young farmers to collaborate with experienced farmers for the purpose of knowledge exchange, and to improve education facilities for them and knowledge dissemination among them using new technology. Furthermore, creating awareness and motivation towards cultivating cultivars recommended by the Tea Research Institute of Sri Lanka (TRISL), with access to planting material from certified plant nurseries, for the respective tea-growing regions, would reduce production-related inefficiencies.  Also, even though tea is predominantly cultivated as a mono crop, coconut and pepper could be intercropped with tea, and therefore, further research on possible intercrops for tea is of timely importance. These observations were made in a research study titled “Determinants of productivity variation and technical efficiency of tea smallholders in the Low Country of Sri Lanka'' authored by H.W. Shyamalie, H.M.C.G. Pilapitiya, B.M.N.C. Karunarathna, and K.W.N. Nadeeshani (attached to the Agricultural Economics Division of the TRISL in St. Coombs, Talawakelle) and published in the Sri Lanka Journal of Food and Agriculture recently.  The study used a sample of 300 randomly selected tea smallholders representing 68 tea inspection regions, namely 25 from Ratnapura, 23 from Galle, and 20 from Matara, proportionate to the population of tea smallholders in each of these Districts as the majority of tea smallholdings in the Low Country are scattered in these three Low Country tea-growing Districts. Data was collected during the course of 2015, through a field survey, using a questionnaire.  Tea smallholders are defined as private owners who have tea cultivations of a land extent of less than four hectares (ha). They occupy 122,448 ha of cultivated tea, thereby accounting for 60% of the total cultivated tea lands as of 2018 while in terms of production, this sector contributed 75% of the total tea production of the same year. The average productivity (ratio of a volume measure of output produced to a volume measure of input used) of the same year was 1,958 kg of made tea per ha.   Although the productivity of the tea smallholdings sector appears to be comparatively higher than the estate plantation sector, the researchers note that there is an extensive gap between the lowest and the highest productivity values. The results showed that the tea production of smallholders varied from 780 kg to 72,000 kg of green leaf per year, while the range of productivity was from 7,706 to 29,640 kg of green leaf per ha per annum. Also, the land, fertilizer, and labour (hired and family), and agrochemical-related factors showed substantial statistical significance with positive signs in terms of a direct impact on the tea-related productivity while the age of the land (plantation) and intercropping too had a positive impact. On the other hand, the farmer's experience and education level, and the cultivar used by them, had a significantly negative impact on the technical inefficiency.  For cultivation, the majority in the sample had used vegetative-propagated tea cultivars, which are more responsive to fertiliser than seedling tea. However, the impact of agrochemicals (pesticides including herbicides/weedicides) was negative for productivity. In this regard, it was observed that while manual, mechanical, and chemical weeding were done for weed control, the majority practiced manual weeding for young fields, which had in turn resulted in high yields.  The researchers noted also that although low in magnitude, several interaction-related effects of fertiliser and labour with other variables were statistically significant.  Regardless of the geographical variation, the authors point out that labour, fertiliser, and chemicals remain the most determinant factors in the estimation of the productivity variation.  Experience, education, occupation, cultivar, and intercropping seem negative according to the study and is significantly impacting inefficiency.  Experience, it was found, was the most influential factor in inefficiency, which has a positive impact. Simply, experienced farmers are more efficient than the less-experienced ones. Fulltime farmers were more efficient than those who did not engage in it fulltime. Similarly, educated farmers are more efficient than the less educated.  Concerning cultivars, it was observed that cultivating-recommended cultivar is also effective as opposed to growing tea cultivars not recommended for the region.  Furthermore, intercropping showed a positive influence towards efficiency.  Determinants for efficiency were considered as the farmer's age, experience, education and occupation, and cultivar and intercropping. Other determinants included the output in terms of the green leaves produced (kg), the land extent cultivated (ha), labour from the family and hired (in terms of man days), fertiliser (kg), the cost of agrochemicals, dolomite (kg), age including plantation experience and education (all three in years), occupation (whether tea cultivation is the only source of income or otherwise), and the clone type (whether the cultivated clone was recommended by the TRISL or otherwise). On the matter of efficiency, a majority belonged to the 70%-80% efficiency level with a mean technical efficiency of 68.81% (ranging from 15%-93.43%), the researchers added, noting that therefore, the possibility of increasing the output without increasing the existing level of input is 31.19%.


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