Farmers get double price for organic tea

Farmers are getting double price for orthodox tea green leaves after being quality certified.
"They are being paid up to Rs 60 per kg of green leaves," said senior programme officer at the Inclusive Development of the Economy (Include) of Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) Arun Rana.
"The amount is more than double the average for orthodox tea green leaves," he said, adding that the Private Public Partnership for Organic Tea Promotion in Ilam has been successful in making tea farmers more quality aware.
"In addition, both the Sunderpaani and Kolbung Cooperatives get additional payments per kg to cover their office expenses," Rana added.
Under the promotion programme, the IMO/EU certification has also enhanced the capacity of organic farming for more than 200 farmers. "Of them 166 tea farmers are certified as organic first time in Nepal and additional 62 farmers are in the stage of conversion," he added.
Through the project, Gorkha Tea Estate has been able to capacitate over 200 smallholder-farmer households towards attaining future market security and they are fetching almost double to Rs 45 to Rs 50, the market average rate for a kg of green leaves.
The successful Private Public Partnership has brought about notable results in the orthodox tea green leaves' farmers due to GIZ Private Public Partnership Project that has not not only be scaled up in the tea subsector but also needs to be replicated in other agriculture subsectors, according to chairman of Gorkha Tea Estate — the first IMO (Switzerland based) and EU certified organic tea in Nepal — Uday Chapagain.
An initiative of GIZ, the 'Organic production of high quality tea in rural areas of Nepal' is a partnership between Gorkha Tea Estate and Tee Geschwender.
Germans tea consumption has increased to 4,500 tonne per annum from earlier 500 tonne, Thomas Holz of Tee Geschwender said, adding that the Germans prefer the quality tea. "Nepali green orthodox tea has great potential as Nepal produces various types of green tea," he added. "With a little more effort Nepal can export more to Germany." Tee Geschwender is one of the biggest tea retailers in Germany with about 25 per cent of the specialised tea trade.