Good teas cannot be produced from badly handled leaf: role of transport and logistics on green leaf supply chain

Abstract

The final quality of tea depends basically on the chemical composition of raw tea leaves. Different types of chemical reactions occur in the fresh leaves after harvesting, such as sugar compounds are decomposed with the respiration process and release a high amount of heat and leading to degrade. This study focused to identify quantity and quality loss of green leaf supply chain, find out socio – economic issues of not following standard operating procedures recommended (SOPs) and good practices, lessons learnt from field. This study is based on primary data collected through structured questionnaires, in-depth interviews with key supply chain actors, non-participatory observations of tea lands, collecting centers, various marketplaces, processing factories, export processing firms and institutions of the enabling environment of the agricultural value and supply chains in Badulla, Kandy, Matale, Galle, Matara and Rathnapura districts. The results revealed that the quantity and quality losses of green leaf supply may occur from plucking, bagging, collecting, transportation, bad weather and type of plucker (trained or untrained). During the rush cropping periods post-harvest losses may increase due to the inadequate labor for plucking and operations, Inadequate leaf bags for managing large tea leaf volumes, and inadequate leaf transport facilities and it leads to increase the quality and quantity losses of green leaf supply chain. Inadequate labor is a significant issue in the tea sector, and the failure to follow recommended SOPs results in low-quality tea leaves. Consequently, this leads to marketability issues, low wages, health and safety problems, inadequate sanitation, and poverty etc. This study recommends to maintain good communication and productive relationships among all parties of the supply chain, supplying better technology, value-adding through product upgrading to minimize the economic losses.