The black tea manufactor in Kenya, which is the world’s leading exporter of this product, sent about half of their workers on forced vacation because of the severe drought, which reduced production by a half. As Apollo Chiari, head of the Kenyan Tea Producers Association, said in an interview to Bloomberg, “we work only three days a week instead of six, because we have nothing to collect and process.” 

Only in the companies that are included in the association, about 55 thousand tea pickers work – now half of them are on forced leave or sent to other non-core works. 

Last year, Kenya’s profit from the sale of 492 million kg of tea amounted to $ 1.4 billion.