As tea planters continue to operate on increasingly lower profit margins, the shift towards cinnamon cultivation, particularly among new planters attracted by favourable market prices, is gradually reducing employment opportunities for plantation workers, the National Planters’ Association said.

Tea cultivation, which requires year-round maintenance, traditionally provides livelihoods for a considerable number of plantation workers. While women are predominantly engaged in tea plucking, men from the community usually undertake labour-intensive activities such as trench digging, crop trimming, fertiliser application, operating heavy machinery, factory work and transporting tea. However, the shift from tea to cinnamon cultivation is reducing the need for some of these activities, affecting employment opportunities within the plantation sector.

Speaking to The Daily Morning, the Association’s President Saman Geeganage said that, as the issue of high fertiliser prices remain unaddressed, new planters are increasingly reluctant to take up tea cultivation and are instead turning to cinnamon. According to him, the cost of the required quantities of fertiliser remains relatively high, while cinnamon offers attractive prices in the market. "But, while the tea plant needs to be fertilised every three months, trimmed properly, and the ground weeded and taken good care of throughout the year, cinnamon can be left alone to grow by itself," he said. He added that plantation workers are gradually losing their jobs and that the situation could become more difficult if traditional tea growers also abandoned tea cultivation.

Earlier, it was reported that tea planters were shifting towards vegetable cultivation due to declining profit margins in the tea industry. High fertiliser prices, low prices for green tea leaves and rising maintenance costs have prompted growers to withdraw from tea cultivation. Despite the marginalisation experienced by plantation workers within the estate system, estate owners had traditionally provided them with employment opportunities when plantations remained profitable.