Political bourgeoisie kill Ceylon Tea
Threats, intimidation and political pressure are mounting against the tea industry, the minister and Tea Board officials by factory owners opposing detections that revealed 53 factories had adulterated the 150 year old Ceylon Tea.
Out of the 740 tea factories in the country the Sri Lanka Tea Board (SLTB) found 53 to have added sugar into the teas to increase the weight and dark colour as a result of which the Tea Factory Owners Association (TFOA) President Harith Ranasinghe has received anonymous telephone calls from overseas numbers insulting him in obscene language; the former SLTB Chairman Dr. Rohan Pethiyagoda and Tea Commissioner being yelled at a recent meeting held on March 20 in the presence of other factory owners as well. The former had also being berated at a recent gathering of these factory owners in Ratnapura; and Plantation Industries Minister Navin Dissanayake has come under intense political pressure to go soft on these offenders some of whom have been warned previously as well and not cancel their licences.
The process involved is first a fine of Rs.50,000 and a warning followed by a suspension of licences for three months and next a cancellation of the licences.
Factories owned by at least two politicians from the ruling parties and another relative of an MP from the opposition were found to have adulterated the teas as a result of which the SLTB has sent a notice of show cause to provide an explanation why action should not be initiated against them. Another factory owner is learnt to have abused SLTB officials stating that he had got away previously as well and noted that he was a donor to the Mahaweliseya as a result of which the government should give cover to him.
However, Minister Dissanayake during this week’s media briefing held to announce the new chairman of the SLTB Lucille Wijewardena said that he would not be lenient with any factory owners but would have a meeting with them next week on the next course of action. But he pointed out that cancelling their licences would only impact the workers and with the New Year around the corner it would hurt them.
Of the 53 factories that have been asked to show cause some of them have agreed to the allegations leveled against them while others have said they would seek legal action against the authorities for carrying out the detections and questioned the basis of the methodology adopted in testing the teas.
TFOA President Ranasinghe told the Business Times that they had been complaining to the authorities and government officials to ensure that detections were carried out against these factories that were adulterating the teas.
As a result, Mr. Ranasinghe said that they were scheduled to have a meeting with the SLTB authorities who would clarify to them the methodology adopted.
For the past six years the association has vehemently opposed the adulteration of tea and asked the industry to stop it and authorities to find the culprits and bring them to book.
Compared to previous detections carried out in this instance the scale has been higher with a large number being netted in. Last year there were 12 factories that were detected.
As an association they would call for explanation from their members once they receive the list of factories that are under inquiry, he said adding that in the past some members had quit their membership when such detections were carried out.
It is learnt that the SLTB had carried out the detections by obtaining samples from the factories and sent it to the laboratories for testing as anonymous. As a result it was only after the final result was received that the samples could be checked to find out who had actually adulterated the teas.
The detections was carried out to look for the sugar in tea by obtaining samples of teas before and after rolling as it has been found out that the sugar is added at the point of rolling the tea leaves.
The detections found that the teas were adulterated with glucose, sucrose and fructose and the factories were found to be mainly from Ratnapura, Galle and Matara.
In addition to testing by the SLTB, the Tea Research Institute (TRI) had also carried out the testing using the sophisticated method – high performance liquid chromatography that detects the high performance of sugar and glucose. Samples had also been sent to an external laboratory as well all of which had fully corroborated with the TRI and SLTB results.
Moreover, in obtaining samples from the factories, one sample was given to the factory manager and another sample stored in the laboratories for future reference while another was sent for testing.
Industry persons opine there needs to be a process of punishment, and the cancellation of the licenses of these offenders is required to ensure no such activity would be carried out in the future as well.