DHAKA: Tea prices in Bangladesh rose 2.61 percent at a weekly auction on Wednesday, after rising 2.42 percent at the previous session, brokers said.
The average price of Bangladesh tea rose to 241.08 taka ($3.00) a kg against 234.93 taka per kg the previous week, an official at the country's largest tea broking firm, National Brokers Limited, said.
More than 2.05 million kg of tea were offered at Bangladesh's sole auction centre in Chittagong, with 2.61 percent unsold, compared with 7.77 percent unsold in the previous auction when 1.8 million kg was offered.
"The market continued to move upwards with more demand from the blenders. Loose tea buyers, although showing good enquiry were mostly out-priced," National Brokers said in its market report.
"Dusts were again a strong market at dearer levels." Around 1.89 million kg will be offered at the next auction on Dec. 26.
Tea sold at the Chittagong auction is mostly bought by domestic buyers.
Bangladesh's tax authority in January imposed a 25 percent duty on imports of tea to safeguard the local industry.
The south Asian country produces 60 million kg of tea a year against demand of 56 million kg. But tea consumption is rising by 4.5 percent annually, in line with steady economic growth.
Center>Copyright Reuters, 2012
Comments
Comments are closed for this article.