It was an economic crisis that felled Sri Lanka’s last elected president - contenders running for his job on Saturday promise to turn the economy around and raise the standard of living on the South Asian island.
That cannot come too soon for the more than 300,000 people who pick Ceylon tea, a crucial sector that accounts for 11 per cent of Sri Lanka’s exports and earns more than US$1 billion a year in vital foreign currency.
Yet tea pickers say they have long faced discrimination, low wages, poor conditions and repeated broken promises of a better future, despite being the backbone of the island’s economy.
“Every election, they make grand promises, but nothing ever changes. No matter who wins, the reality for us remains the same,” tea worker Irangani, who uses only one name, told Context.
Her feelings reflect a wider sense of disillusionment among tea workers, who have seen little change in their conditions, despite frequent promises from politicians.
On Saturday, some 17 million Sri Lankans go to the polls in the nation’s first electoral test since a debilitating financial crisis in 2022 unleashed mass protest and forced the then-president, Gotabaya Rajapaksa, to flee the country.
Two years on, the economy remains the top issue for voters. Higher taxes, prolonged inflation and a stagnant job market have plunged a quarter of the population into poverty and pushed thousands to migrate.
For those left behind struggling, candidates have promised economic recovery plans and pledged to curb inflation, show zero tolerance for corruption and stimulate job creation.
Huddled in a tiny house - little more than a shack - with cracked walls and a leaking roof, 49-year-old Irangani said she could barely provide for her three children by picking tea.
“Despite working from dawn to dusk, our salaries do not cover even our basic needs,” she said, pointing to her dilapidated home in Ragala, a remote mountain village in central Sri Lanka.
Like many tea estate workers, Irangani’s family lacks any domestic privacy, sanitation, and access to proper healthcare and education.
In May, the president promised of a significant wage hike for tea workers - a rise in daily wages from 1,000 Sri Lankan Rupees (US$3.29) to 1,700. But industry leaders pushed back.
The Planters’ Association of Ceylon (PA), which represents the interests of plantation companies and tea estate owners, said the increase could jeopardise Sri Lanka’s competitive edge in the global tea market and threaten its dollar earnings.
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Increased guaranteed wages that meet the condition of a living wage, additional incentives for productivity-based earnings, effective social safety nets and social insurance, and upskilling so workers can move to other forms of higher-paid employment are essential.
Helani Galpaya, CEO, LIRNEasia
“A state-mandated 70 per cent fixed wage increase could lead to financial ruin for many companies,” said PA spokesperson Roshan Rajadurai.
The proposed hike was duly cancelled, leaving many workers feeling betrayed and anxious about their future.
“For years, we have been promised a better future, but every time, we are let down,” said Irangani.
Harsh realities
Other tea workers are paid even less. Seventy-five-year-old K. Mahalingam said the plantation where he works urged him to be paid by the weight of leaves he picked rather than hours worked.
He said he earns around 12,000 rupees (US$39), much lower than the minimum wage of around 20,000, and is allowed to tend a parcel of land to grow food.
“This way, we are turned into farmers, that too without any land ownership,” Mahalingam said. “We are receiving about 40 per cent less than the market price for the tea we produce.”
Estate workers, who are mostly of Tamil descent, say they have faced hardship since their ancestors were brought from India by British colonialists in the 19th century.
“The system has become a vicious cycle, not allowing these people to take the next step to start a better life,” said Sugumaran Vijayakumar, an attorney advocating for plantation workers. “This is modern slavery.”
Yet the sector’s own figures suggest it is thriving.
According to the latest statistics on the Sri Lanka Tea Board website, at the end of April 2023, tea auction sale income increased by 43 per cent, reaching 104 billion rupees compared to 73 billion in 2022.
Similarly, export revenue also saw a substantial rise, increasing by 58 per cent to 140 billion rupees from 89 billion in the same period.
State help?
Samurdhi – the key state programme set up to ease poverty – has faced criticism when it comes to the estate sector.
A study from LIRNEasia – a regional think tank based in the capital Colombo - highlighted low awareness of the social safety net among tea estate communities, in part, it said, due to racial biases.
The study found that many Tamil communities could not access the benefits as application forms were often only available in Sinhala, the language spoken by the majority population.
Helani Galpaya, CEO of LIRNEasia, emphasised the need for a comprehensive package of support for plantation workers.
“Increased guaranteed wages that meet the condition of a living wage, additional incentives for productivity-based earnings, effective social safety nets and social insurance, and upskilling so workers can move to other forms of higher-paid employment are essential,” she said.
This story was published with permission from Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers humanitarian news, climate change, resilience, women’s rights, trafficking and property rights. Visit https://www.context.news/.
