Organic tea factory to come up in Kerela

A group of farmers in Wayanad district in Kerela may soon launch an organic green tea factory with a view to revive the sector.

 

The factory under the Wayanad Green Tea Producer Company, a collective of 147 small-scale tea growers envisions to ensures a sustainable income for farmers in the sector by avoiding middlemen.

 

It also aims at produce and market speciality tea, like organic green tea at affordable prices. Over the past decade, the Tea Board of India has taken initiatives to motivate small-scale tea growers to work as collectives by forming producer-societies or self-help groups for sustainable green tea leaf trade.

 

There are over 1,200 SHGs in the tea sector in the country, but most of them are left at the hands of bought-leaf factories in the absence of any processing facilities.

 

The factory has a capacity to process 1,200 kg of green tea leaf a day.  It has been set up at a cost of Rs. 83 lakh, including Rs. 45.80 lakh as assistance from NABARD and Rs. 3 lakh as start-up grant of the State Industries Department.