Around the world, tea is one of the world’s most consumed drinks. Pictured above are tea leaves collected in Nshili, Nyaruguru, one of the poorest districts in Rwanda. Here, tea plantations are owned collectively by over 2,500 smallholder farmers over hundreds of hectares of rolling hills.
In Rwanda, tea has always been an important commodity for the economy. Alphonsine Mukanziza is a tea picker and community leader in Nshili. Each day, she and other tea pickers gather up to 40 kilograms of tea leaves a day.
After the tea is collected it is brought to tea factories to be sold. The factory pictured here buys green tea leaves from the cooperative and processes them. In the COTHENK tea factory in the Nshili-Kivu area, workers spread the tea leaves out to ready it for withering. After the leaves are processed, they are shipped by truck to the Mombasa Tea Auction to be sold within the week.
Tea is also one of Sri Lanka’s main export crops. In the Elkaduwa Matle area, the IFAD-supported Matle Regional Economic Advancement Project (MREAP) finances income-generating activities, such as tea plantations. The project has supported poor rural people, particularly women in generating income through tea farming, as well as making sure they have a voice in decision-making at all levels.
About two-thirds of Sri Lankan tea is produced by smallholder farmers, like Sisiliya Rajapaksha, pictured above. Sisiliya is a 72 year-old tea picker on a small tea field in Galatha village. Worldwide, tea production by smallholders is growing.
Around the world, tea farming has the potential to be a viable source of income, improving the lives of smallholder farmers in countries like Sri Lanka, Rwanda or Vietnam, pictured above. Tea has been around for thousands of years, and it will continue to contribute to the empowerment of smallholder farmers for years to come.
