Colombo, Jul 19 (IANS): Sri Lanka will launch a $50 million global tea promotion, starting from Russia in September to boost awareness of Ceylon Tea among 12 important markets, Plantation Industries Minister Navin Dissanayake has said.

Dissanayake told journalists that this move will be the first of its kind in 150 years as the government is promoting Ceylon Tea on such a large scale, Xinhua news agency reported on Friday.

The promotion in Russia will be followed by a mega advertising and publicity campaign in Ukraine in October and then mega advertising campaigns in Japan and China at the end of the year.

The other target markets within the campaign include the US, Australia, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Iran, Chile and Germany.

"We have finally been able to get over the government tender procedures on the Ceylon Tea global promotion campaign and it will be launched in September in Russia. A total budget of Rs 5.5 billion ($50 million) has been allocated for this campaign," Dissanayake said.

With a better year expected for the tea industry, the government said it was targeting a revenue of $1.6 billion from its tea exports in 2019.