Guwahati: Small tea growers can now  turn their business into a purpose-driven brand with new tools at their disposal.

Solidaridad a  global sustainability organisation which has championed the cause of the small and marginal farmers has introduced innovative products designed for tea farmers offering  affordable farmer-friendly innovative solutions  to turn their business into a purpose-driven brand.

The organisation has vast experience in supporting sustainability programmes nationally and internationally involving tea among other commodities. The organisation fosters sustainable and inclusive supply chains, focusing on bringing prosperity, harnessing inclusivity, and producing in balance with nature.

The tools  were displayed at the India International Small Tea Growers Convention  in Calcutta recently which  discussed and address challenges faced by small growers and discussed solutions that can address the sustainability issues in the tea industry.

The convention was  organised by Solidaridad Asia in partnership with the Indian Tea Association.

An official of  Solidaridad Asia said over a million small tea growers in India and from other countries depend on the tea industry for their existence. The tea business is critical to rural livelihood as well as the economy of the producing countries. Promoting long-term health, well-being, and environmental sustainability in the tea business should be a top priority, but the sector is facing a crisis because of persistently low tea prices, which are crushing the small tea farmers.

India is the second largest tea producer in the world, with over 80% of production coming from Assam and Bengal.  Indian tea production has grown significantly over the last few years with share of small tea growers rising sharply, currently there are over 2 lakh small growers spread across the country. Area under small tea growers is 2.1 lakh hectare while that under big tea growers is 4.2 lakh hectare; but productivity of small tea growers is  higher because of younger bush profile and relatively higher usage of inputs.

Mostly the leaves from STGs are processed in the Bought Leaf Factories ( BLFs) ; currently there are over 700 BLFs across the country. Growth in STGs has led to proliferation of leaf agents (who collect leafs from STGs and supply to BLFs) which are by and large unregulated.

Small tea growers occupy an important place in the tea industry as they produce more than 50 per cent of tea and the figure will increase to 60 per cent in the next couple of years.

The growers face plethora of problems which need attention from policy makers in order to ensure sustenance of the tea industry. The problems range from low awareness about good agriculture practices, distortion in price sharing mechanism, low access to finance among others.

Along with above challenges, sustainability of STGs is a concern with continual rise in cost of production without commensurate growth in green leaf prices.

"To  empower the farmers to turn their business into a purpose-driven brand, Solidaridad is planning to introduce SoliTrace as a part of TRINITEA, a make-in-India sustainability initiative involving smallholder tea farmers and a QR code technology that would allow consumers to interact with the tea producers, as well as learn about the safety and quality standards adopted. More than 92,000 small tea growers have already become members of TRINITEA programme and by the end of 2022, the target is to engage 1,00,000 small tea growers. Such innovation will gradually empower the small tea growers and workers’ associations by helping them build independent, democratic organisations, improve their negotiation position with buyers/employers, achieve economic stability, make joint investments, and increase their collective influence.

 The other products for farmers are SoliProbe, an instant soil analyzer, SoliMet, a hyper-local weather station, SoliBot an interactive chatbot, and Ballotronix, an instant tea leaf reader. The Ballotronix, an instant tea leaf reader will give a fair grading of farmer's leaves and give them the right price for their products. The Solimet combines next generation artificial intelligence and high precision sensor systems to dekliver hyperlocal weather, soil and plant monitoring along with industry first features.

Officials said transparency and sustainability at every stage of supply is needed now. There is a growing consciousness among consumers on social and ecological footprints of their purchases, regulatory bodies looking to adopt stringent policies towards human rights or environmental rules violation and Food safety and quality are major concerns  and risk of brand abandonment and product recalls are high.

The meeting  discussed the role of smallholder farmers in the tea industry and ways to promote their health and well-being and make their businesses environmentally sustainable. There were  technical sessions featuring presentations and talks by captains of the industry and experts including Small Grower representatives about various aspects of value and supply chains as well the innovative digital tools demonstrating their advantages.

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