Tea prices in Bangladesh were barely changed at the weekly auction amid tepid demand from local buyers despite a lower volume on offer. Bangladeshi tea fetched an average price of 236.44 taka ($2.80) per kg at the auction held on Tuesday, compared with a revised price of 236.76 taka at the previous sale, National Brokers said.
There was muted demand overall although supplies were lower than last week, a senior official at National Brokers said. Around 14 percent of the 2.67 million kg offered at the sole auction centre in Chittagong was unsold. In the previous auction, 21 percent of the 2.75 million kg on offer was unsold. Bangladesh's tea production jumped nearly 27 percent last year to a record 85 million kg, helped by favourable weather conditions and making imports a choice not a necessity.
The South Asian country was the world's fifth-largest tea exporter in the 1990s but is now a net importer due to a surge in domestic consumption in line with economic growth.
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