Firm to raise tea output

Firm to raise tea output

JAKARTA (JP): State-owned tea company PTP XII aims to increase production by 34.69 percent to 66,000 tons this year, up from last year's level of 49,000 tons, an executive says.

Insyaf Malik, PTP XII's production director, was quoted as saying by Antara yesterday that the output target, however, depends on weather conditions.

"I think the objective is reachable, bearing in mind that in 1993 we could produce 62,000 tons," he said at his office in Bandung, West Java.

Analysts estimate that Indonesia last year exported about 120,000 tons of tea, 60 percent of which was produced by state- owned plantations.

Although the world tea market has been sluggish, evidenced in the commodity's low price of less than US$1 per kilogram, Malik said that producers must continue to promote the product aggressively. (hdj)