Sudan tea export ban threatens nascent value addition hub in Mombasa

The recent ban on tea imports from Kenya had only a passing mention in the media. Some commentators downplayed its impact suggesting that Sudan is a captive market that will end up sourcing Kenya’s tea from alternative markets in the Middle East. This comforting attitude hails from the fact that Kenya remains a top exporter of tea and boasts the best quality in the world. It might well be that the total volume of tea sold will not suffer much, if at all.

For Mombasa, the ban threatens to strip off a lucrative layer of commercial activity. Unbeknown to most people, a nascent value-addition hub for tea has been growing in Mombasa. For the exports to Sudan, virtually all value addition is done in Mombasa.

The sub-sector employees more than 1,000 people daily mostly involved in sorting and packing. A whopping 25 million kilogrammes or about 95 per cent of all fully packaged teas exported from Kenya goes directly to the table in Sudan. Unlike the bulk of our exports, which end up as a raw superior blend for diverse teas worldwide, the Sudan market generates jobs locally across the entire value chain. This has an impact on the packaging industry as well as the final blending and grading.

It also creates extra demand for premises for warehousing and processing in Mombasa. While a whole chunk of the clearing and forwarding business migrated to Athi River and Nairobi with the advent of the Standard Gauge Railway, a small core remains in Mombasa with tea being chief among the products exported. The ban threatens jobs across the entire chain including all aspects of logistics tied to the sub sector.

Coming on the heels of the twin disasters that assailed Mombasa in the recent past, the ban threatens to trigger a new cycle of doom. While tourism has recently regained its footing with visitor numbers on the rise, the logistics sector is teetering with the entry of the SGR.

Demand for warehousing and office space has flagged, leaving many premises unused or underutilised. As stakeholders rallied to undo draconian regulations requiring all imported cargo cleared in Nairobi, Covid-19 reared its ugly head decimating all sectors. Mombasa has never been the same.

Commercial activity in the central business district has not returned to pre-Covid levels. The number of eateries has reduced and popular hotels in the CBD shut down as the number of business travellers fell. A shadow of its former self, the CBD slows to a ghost town early and certainly in most parts by 9 pm. That means the dream of a 24-hour economy tied to port operations has not been realised. With this missed dream, jobs fizzled.

It is unfortunate that the tea ban not only threatens local jobs in Mombasa but also could nip in the bud the entire value addition industry in the tea sector down to the farmer. With Kenya literally exporting jobs to Europe, Pakistan and the Middle East as the bulk of the tea blending takes place in these region’s, the ban snuffs out any hope of developing a local mainstay.

Establishing a foothold in value-addition is especially important as technology threatens to disrupt the industrial sector abroad. With the adaption of artificial intelligence in manufacturing, new smart factories requiring little human intervention may soon make local investment in agroprocessing untenable.

The new development comes on the back of a shortened shelf life for Kenyan tea exported to Sudan. Previously, teas exported to Sudan had a shelf life of three years. A concerted effort by the Tea Board of Kenya, through an intervention by former President Uhuru Kenyatta, stayed the three-year shelf life. However, this has now been scrapped and the new requirement is 18 months only. For Kenya, this presents logistical challenges in the wake of rising insecurity in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden.

While it used to take an average of 25 days for shipments from Kenya to reach Port Sudan, this has now increased to 70 days. The disruption caused by the attacks on cargo ships in the region are effectively cutting the marketing period for Kenyan teas in Sudan. It also means current shipments held up in the port or in high seas due to the ban risk expiry before the matter is resolved.

As stakeholders in the sector scramble to find alternative markets, it is high time that the national government engaged widely to find an amicable solution. Some actors have suggested diversifying to West Africa. However, the logistics of establishing a new market while in distress are challenging.

It is also questionable if a market reliant on cheap dusts from China can swivel towards premium tea at short notice. The nascent tea value addition sector in Mombasa is in crisis and it is crying out for help."