Tea Board asks manufacturing units to close operations from mid December

Kolkata, Oct 31 (IANS) Tea Board on Wednesday ordered tea producing units of West Bengal, Bihar, Sikkim, Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand to stop plucking or receiving green leaves from December 16, allowing processing of green leaf at the factory for all units till the same period.

"Last date of plucking/receiving of green leaves for all tea factories is December 15 and the last date of processing of green leaf at the factory for all units is December 16," the order said.

The board also asked the tea manufacturing units to submit the closure declaration by December 17.

It also set the deadline for completion of sorting, grapping, packing of CTC variety and moving the packed teas to storage area by December 27 for CTC tea manufacturer and December 31 for orthodox or green tea makers.