Tea producers in Turkey’s northeastern province of Rize are continuing to harvest tea well into December, a rare occurrence attributed to above-average temperatures.
Typically, the tea harvest in the Black Sea region concludes by the end of October. However, this year’s mild weather has allowed farmers to carry out a fourth harvest during the final month of the year.
As the official purchasing period by the state-run tea enterprise Çaykur, the main buyer of tea, already ended, producers sell their crops to private factories.
'An advantage brought by climate change'
Bünyamin Arslan, head of the Rize Chamber of Agriculture, highlighted the link between changing climate patterns and the prolonged harvest season.
“Global climate change has brought various challenges to our region, such as floods, landslides, and other natural disasters,” Arslan said. “But it has also created an advantage in terms of the tea production period. This year, a fourth tea harvest is taking place in December due to the warm weather.”
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“From what I’ve heard from my elders, such an extended tea harvest has not happened in Rize’s history," he added. "Thanks to the warm weather, we’ve had a high-quality harvest. Still, we cannot predict the long-term consequences of this situation.”
A local producer also commented on the quality of the yield, telling state broadcaster TRT that the output from the late harvest was the same as the previous harvests.
Turkey, one of the world's top tea-consuming countries, produces nearly 70% of its consumed tea in Rize, according to Çaykur figures.
The extended tea season comes amid unusually high temperatures across the country. According to data from the State Meteorological Service, this year's November was the third-warmest November in the past 55 years. The average temperature across Turkey rose to 12.2 degrees Celsius, up from the seasonal norm of 9.3 degrees recorded between 1991 and 2020. (VK)
