'Difficult to even have one meal': Sri Lankan tea workers struggle as crisis hits

Record ID: 1671514

  • Title: 'Difficult to even have one meal': Sri Lankan tea workers struggle as crisis hits
  • Date: 5th May 2022
  • Summary: BOGAWANTALAWA, SRI LANKA (RECENT - APRIL 29, 2022) (REUTERS) TEA PLANTATION VARIOUS OF ARULAPPAN GETTING READY TO GO TO WORK ARULAPPAN LEAVING FOR WORK ARULAPPAN WALKING TO WORK WITH HER HUSBAND, MICHAEL COLIN VARIOUS OF TEA PICKER, ARULAPPAN IDEIJODY, PLUCKING TEA LEAVES ARULAPPAN LOOKING ON ARULAPPAN'S HANDS PLUCKING TEA LEAVES ARULAPPAN PLUCKING TEA LEAVES (SOUNDBITE) (Sinhala) TEA PICKER, ARULAPPAN IDEIJODY, SAYING: “What we earn is not enough to eat, let alone for other expenses. We can only eat one meal. I get paid 900 rupees ($2.55) every day I work. We go to work after having a cup of tea. Sugar prices have gone up. If we are to eat a piece of roti (Indian flatbread), (we have to contend with) the price of wheat flour having gone up, and the price of rice having gone up. Everything has gone up in price.” VARIOUS OF MICHAEL PLUCKING TEA IN ESTATE VARIOUS OF TEA ESTATE WORKERS' LIVING QUARTERS IN THE HILLS VARIOUS OF EXTERIOR OF ARULAPPAN'S LIVING QUARTERS WOMEN OUTSIDE ARULAPPAN'S LIVING QUARTERS ARULAPPAN LIGHTING CANDLE AND PRAYING LIT CANDLE NEXT TO RELIGIOUS SHRINE VARIOUS OF ARULAPPAN'S DAUGHTER HAVING HAIR COMBED BEFORE SCHOOL (SOUNDBITE) (Sinhala) TEA PICKER, ARULAPPAN IDEIJODY, SAYING: “(Even a daily salary of) 1,000 rupees ($2.83), even 5,000 rupees ($14.14) is not enough. I think we will have to work the whole time and even at night. It is difficult to even have one meal. I can’t say what will happen to those who work in estates.” ARULAPPAN AND MICHAEL IN KITCHEN ARULAPPAN KNEADING DOUGH VARIOUS OF MICHAEL STARTING A FIRE ARULAPPAN AND MICHAEL COOKING BY FIRE ARULAPPAN'S HANDS COOKING ROTI (INDIAN FLATBREAD) VARIOUS OF ARULAPPAN’S FAMILY EATING WHILST WATCHING TELEVISION MICHAEL DRINKING (SOUNDBITE) (Sinhala) TEA PICKER, ARULAPPAN IDEIJODY, SAYING: “We don’t have money. So, we have not been able to buy school books. We couldn’t put covers on books. It costs 200 rupees ($0.57) for the child to go to school and back by bus. We have to pay class fees. Things are difficult.” VARIOUS OF WOMEN OUTSIDE ARULAPPAN'S LIVING QUARTERS TEA PLANTATION
  • Embargoed: 19th May 2022 04:08
  • Keywords: Bogawantalawa Sri Lanka crisis currency devaluation economy farmer picker plantation production tea tea workers
  • Location: BOGAWANTALAWA, SRI LANKA
  • City: BOGAWANTALAWA, SRI LANKA
  • Country: Sri Lanka
  • Topics: Asia / Pacific,Government/Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVA001550203052022RP1
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text: On a lush plantation in Sri Lanka, Arulappan Ideijody deftly plucks the tips of each tea bush, throwing them over her shoulder into an open basket on her back.
    After a month of picking more than 18 kg (40-lb) of such tea leaves each day, she and her husband, fellow picker Michael Colin, 48, receive about 30,000 rupees, currently worth about $80 after the island nation devalued its currency.
    Their earnings must support the couple's three children and her elderly mother-in-law.
    “What we earn is not enough to eat, let alone for other expenses. We can only eat one meal. I get paid 900 rupees ($2.55) every day I work," she said.
    Arulappan is one of the millions of Sri Lankans reeling from the island's worst economic crisis in decades. The COVID-19 pandemic severed the tourism lifeline of the Indian Ocean nation, already short of revenue in the wake of steep tax cuts by the government.
    The tea industry, which supports hundreds of thousands of people, also suffered from a controversial government decision last year to ban chemical fertilisers as a health measure. First-quarter tea production fell 15% on the year to its lowest since 2009, with the Sri Lanka Tea Board saying dry weather had taken a toll on bushes that received insufficient fertiliser after the ban.
    Plantation workers like Arulappan, who hail predominantly from the island's Tamil minority, are affected more than most, as they own no land to provide a cushion against soaring food prices.
    The prices of staples like sugar, wheat flour, and rice have gone up according to her, the result of rampant inflation after Sri Lanka was left critically short of foreign currency to buy essential supplies of food.
    "It is difficult to even have one meal. I can’t say what will happen to those who work in estates,” said Arulappan from her 'line house', one of 17 single-storey units set in rows around the plantation in Bogawantalawa, a four-hour drive from capital Colombo.
    Outside their home, Arulappan carefully combed the hair of a daughter departing for school.
    "We have not been able to buy school books. We couldn’t put covers on books… we have to pay class fees. Things are difficult," she lamented.
    The cost of the two-kilometre bus ride to the local school for the couple's two school-age children has also more than doubled in recent months, adding further pressure on expenses.
    However, the couple continue to pay for private tuition for them, in the hope of a better life, with husband Michael adamant he never wants to see his kids work on a plantation.
    "I think we will have to work the whole time and even at night," reflected Arulappan wistfully.
    (Production: Channa Kumara, Waruna Karunatilake, Kokkai Ng)
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