Tea
on Roundabouts in Delhi (India), 02/May/2011 14:12, 34 days ago
Britain, next to Ireland, is the world’s biggest tea drinking nation. Collectively we drink 165 million cups of tea a day which equates to 60.2 billion cups of tea a year. Presumably that means we also consume around 60.2 billion digestive biscuits a year as well but I’ve yet to confirm this particular statistic.The British have been perfecting the art of tea drinking since it first arrived in the UK in the 16thCentury. It’s our standby mechanism for taking a break from the working day, our emotional go to drink when we’re feeling sad or consoling a friend, a favourite remedy for cooling you down on a hot day and a socially acceptable excuse for inviting the new neighbour round. We even have set times of day at which it should traditionally be drank and I genuinely believe my body is built to function more effectively if I drink tea at 11am and again at 5pm (and a few more times in between). And yet if I’m honest, I’ve never really given a great deal of thought to where all this tea I drink comes from and the process it goes through to eventually arrive in my local supermarket.Last week I visited two tea estates in Kurseong, north east India. My dad and I were taken around the factory and shown where they dry the tea, grind the tea leaves, sift out the tips of the tea leaves, separate the tea dust (this is what goes into tea bags) from the leaves and then bag it up ready to be shipped around the world. Outside on the tea plantation our guide, Sobin, introduced us to a group of women picking tea near to the pathway. They smiled and giggled when my dad bowed down, hands together and said‘Namaste’ in faltering Hindi. I’d made him practice at breakfast that morning;“Dad, what’s the word for hello in Hindi?”“Namanas”“No, Namaste. Again.”“Namaskaria”“No, Na-ma-ste…”So whether he’d actually been saying “hello” or an anglicised variation of I’m not quite sure.Sobin explained that the women are expected to pick 4kg of tea a day and for this they are paid Rs.92 per day. In addition they are given 10kg of rice every 15days and provided with a house to live in next to the plantation and free medical care. They are also provided with a pair of blue standard issue wellingtons and a parasol to keep the sun off. Rs.92 is the equivalent of£1.27 in the UK. It is probably just about enough money to be able to buy the basic food items and amenities needed to support a small family (4/5people). It is unlikely to be enough for them to be able to build up any kind of savings, experience a life outside of the tea estate or pay for things like their children’s school and transport fees (the transport costs alone to send a child to school beyond 5thgrade are around Rs.600 as all the secondary schools are outside of Kurseong). Once they retire the women are no longer entitled to the house and free medical care. When this happens the hope is that they have family outside of the tea estate that they can stay with (most likely their children and/or grandchildren) but this is not the case for all of them.One of the food store chains that this particular tea estate supplies to is Harrods in London. For a box of Darjeeling tea“picked exclusively for Harrods” as it claims on the packet, it would set you back £15.95 for 125g. The ladies on the tea estate would have to work for 13 days and pick 50kg of tea to earn the same amount. Of course the average British person doesn’t tend to buy their tea from Harrods. A standard 125g packet of tea bags would probably cost you around 90p which equates to approximately £28.80 being charged per 4kg of tea. However, that still means that only 4% of the cost of the tea that we’re buying is contributing to the wages of these women.I had always made the assumption that Fair Trade means a fair price for the producer but also a fair wage and working conditions for the workers. The tea estates that we visited are both part of the Fair Trade Labelling Organisation (FLO). However, although they operate under Fair Trade conditions, there is no fair trade minimum price set for Darjeeling tea. This means that the fair trade premium they receive can be used to pay for facilities (i.e. the blue wellington boots and sun parasols) rather than going directly to the workers. Coupled with this is the problem of overproduction. Currently tea consumption is increasing at 1% whilst production is increasing at a rate of 2%. Oversupply has therefore led to falling tea prices and wages of estate workers. With intergovernmental cooperation fairer wages for workers could be achieved but so far this hasn’t happened.I freely admit to not being the most conscientious consumer when it comes to doing my weekly shop, particularly the week before payday when 2 for 1 offers often override ethical buying, but for some time now I’ve bought Fair Trade tea and coffee. However, my visit to the tea estate and subsequent research has made me realise that I have an additional responsibility as a consumer to question what that Fair Trade label actually means, who is receiving that money and what are they doing with it.As for Harrods, I’ve already begun to pen my proposal letter, “Namanas Mr Al Fayed, Chairman of Harrods…regarding your ‘picked exclusively for Harrods tea,’ I would like to propose that 10% of the profits from this tea go towards setting up the Kurseong tea estate workers’ retirement fund…”References and further reading if you’re interested:UK Tea Council:www.tea.co.ukFairtrade Internationalhttp://www.fairtrade.net/Plant Cultureshttp://www.kew.org/plant-cultures/plants/tea_production__trade_fairtrade_tea.htmlFair trade minimum pricing:http://sarahbesky.wordpress.com/