☕ Why 50%+ Tea Farmers Want to Sell Their Farms?
In a country where tea is of the utmost importance why do farmers want to sell their plantations?
A rainy day, a blanket, pakode and chai.
The morning newspaper and garma-garam chai.
Evening gossip, Parle-G and shaam ki chai.
It seems no part of an Indian’s day is complete without tea (sorry coffee-lovers, tea is still India’s favourite).
In fact our India ki chai has gotten so famous that even Starbucks now sells chai tea latte.
But for one very special tea, trouble is brewing in India.
More than half the tea estates in India that grow Darjeeling tea are on sale now. Wondering why?
🤔 What’s Up with Darjeeling Tea?
The strong aroma of a billion households brewing tea each day has reached all corners of the world, causing our tea to be in high demand.
Countries like Germany, Russia, Iran and even the US import our tea.
And one of the most famous Indian teas has to be Darjeeling tea. This fame has brought on a hefty price tag: Rs.550-Rs. 1,000 per kg.
Some Darjeeling tea even sells for Rs. 1,80,000 per kilo!
Around 87 tea estates in West Bengal produce Darjeeling tea and more than 80% of the tea we produce is exported. After all, it is a tradition in India to keep the best things for the guests.
But now this world-famous tea may be in trouble because many farmers want to sell their lands and get out of the business. Why?
📜 Reasons for Quitting Darjeeling Tea
The number one reason for farmers wanting to get out of the tea business is lack of demand.
In happier times, when people didn’t have to worry about inflation, recession, and high power bills, they were willing to spend exorbitant amounts to sip on this delicious tea, especially foreigners.
But now with a literal war looming, they are not so keen on having what is popularly known as the “champagne of teas”.
Europeans especially have dialled down tea imports probably because they can’t waste precious gas on boiling it.
And Japan, one of our other major importers, has reduced dependence on us since 2017 and has started prioritising Nepal.
Because in 2017, due to the Gorkhaland agitation (protests in which Nepali speaking Indians were demanding a separate state), tea estates were shut down for around 4 months.
So, a lot of our importers ditched us for other countries.
And while some came back, others like Japan have mostly maintained their distance.
So, demand and exports have remained relatively low, making it difficult for tea farmers to continue operations and pay labourers.
And this is just the beginning of their problems.
Like we mentioned, Darjeeling tea is expensive. One reason for this high cost is that it has a Geographical Indicator tag. Huh?
A GI tag is like a trademark that specifies the origin point of any food or edible product.
So, only tea grown in Darjeeling has this tag and can be sold as Darjeeling tea.
This means the quality of the tea is guaranteed, which raises its price in the market.
But thanks to India signing the South Asian Free Trade Agreement (SAFTA), things have changed.
🧐 How a Trade Agreement is Causing a Tea Crisis
Under the SAFTA, any import of tea from Nepal is duty-free.
So, a lot of exporters are buying cheap Nepal tea and mixing it with Darjeeling tea to make more money.
Some are even mislabelling Nepali tea as Darjeeling tea.
But this move has backfired.
You see, chai-lovers will always know if you mess with their tea. And these chai-lovers have identified that the tea that they are now getting is not up to the mark.
So, they don’t want to pay the same amount of money for this inferior quality chai.
This has caused prices of Darjeeling tea to go down by Rs. 70-80/kg in international markets.
Reduced exports + reduced prices = disaster for tea growers.
So, selling their farms seems like the only option.
And while this seems sad news to you and I, many real estate agents and hotel chains are actually really happy about this.
Because they can use part of this land to create resorts.
You see, to boost the earnings of tea plantations, the West Bengal government had allowed plantations to set aside 15% of their land for tea tourism (as long as this land is not more than 150 acres).
And as travel is experiencing a boost (the weaker rupee may even convince a lot of foreigners to travel to India), many are ready to buy out these farmers’ land.
Seems like a happy ending, no?
But if things were this simple would we cover this topic?
😥 The Problem with Tea Tourism
With exports down, tea tourism sounds like the perfect way to boost earnings of tea pickers.
And you never know, living in a tea plantation could just cause more people to fall in love with the Darjeeling tea, increasing demand.
However, climate change has entered the chat.
And it has caused tea yields to decline majorly.
Darjeeling tea production has gone down from 11 million kgs during its prime days to 7.15 million kgs now.
With climate change getting worse and worse and these tea tourism resorts occupying more cultivable land, will Darjeeling tea be able to survive?
Or are we close to losing this treasure?
⚡ In a line: Darjeeling tea is losing its aroma because of inflation, adulteration and climate change.
💡 Quick question: What steps can we take to help these farmers and boost tea production?
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