New Chairman of the Sri Lanka Tea Board Jayampathy Molligoda stressed that Sri Lanka could easily leverage on our rich ‘Ceylon’ heritage but, we needed to understand the global trends in consumer preferences and align.
He said that the next generation viewed sustainability as a key buying consideration.
He also noted that Sri Lanka could also use its country’s geographical positioning as it was strategically located. The present generations were moving away from traditional teas and are looking to lifestyle and health products such as flavours, infusions, natural and organic and ‘HORECA’ products such as Latte, Chai, Bubble etc.
“Unfortunately, the ‘origin’ will be increasingly lesser a factor of importance. We need to work on this area,” Molligoda told Daily News Finance.
President Gotabaya Rajapaksa wanted us to make use of our Ambassadors to promote Ceylon Tea to develop this industry.Molligoda also stressed that lanka’s main strengths were its expertise - wealth of experience in tasting, blending and product creations, availability of labour (packaging etc.) at competitive rates, vast pool of tea knowledge in marketing, growing & manufacturing including value added bagging, flavor etc.
Commenting on the importance of reaching a consensus among the stakeholders, he said “The way forward would be to have a shared understanding among stakeholders and reaching a consensus on implementing this industry strategy. The ultimate success depends on the commitment by the stake holders to implement this ‘new business model’ efficiently and effectively.
The speedy solutions to problems will shape the future sustainability of the Sri Lankan tea industry.
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