Pakistan has huge potential to become self-sufficient in catering to the tea demand in the country.
According to the Director of the National Tea and High-Value Crop Research Institute Dr. Abdul Waheed, the Country can meet 95% of the national demand for tea if it is planted on an additional 2,000 hectares of land offered by the government and invested by private companies.
“We have done much research in collaboration with China. The tea research institute was also built on the recommendation of Chinese researchers and was later renamed as National Tea and High-Value Crop Research Institute,” the Director stated further in an interview with China Economic Net (CEN).
In 2021, Pakistan imported 2,258,000 kg of black and green tea for $596 million, and this heavy demand and reliance on the import of tea calls for enhancing the local production capacity. In just the first three quarters (July-March) of the fiscal year 2021-22, an increase of 11.95% as compared to the corresponding period of last year has been recorded in the tea sector.
Dr. Abdul Waheed underlined the need to follow commercialization and stated, “We have 64,000 hectares of land suitable for tea plantation. But so far only less than 80 hectares are dedicated to tea plantations. We must use at least 2,000 to 10,000 hectares under public-private partnership in the first year.”
