Tanzania tea transformation
Source：stir tea coffee
From：Taiwan Trade Center, Nairobi
Update Time：2024/04/15
Agronomists in 1904 advised settlers in German East Africa — a vast colony encompassing what is now Burundi, Rwanda, mainland Tanzania, and part of Mozambique — to “think big” and clear large tracts of virgin rainforest in the Usambara Mountains and in Rungwe. After Germany left, British planters began establishing tea estates there in the 1920s. Tanzania became independent in 1961
Today it is the third-largest tea-producing country in Africa, thanks increasingly to smallholders. Unlike neighboring Kenya, where multinationals own massive plantations like Kericho, an estate that spans 21,500 acres, there are few plantations in Tanzania larger more than 1,000 hectares. Tanzania’s total land under tea is one-tenth of the amount in Kenya.
The sector has 32,000 small growers, each farming less than a hectare, who work almost half of the country’s 24,006 ha under tea, according to the Tea Board of Tanzania. These smallholders collectively produce about 40% of the country’s green leaf. Tanzania’s large estates have 12,445 hectares under tea.
Tanzania’s tea industry once was dominated by large estates. But today smallholders are a major force, and the government is working to increase linkages, integration, and efficiencies among them. The national plan envisions grower-owned cooperatives and clusters of extension-service-trained smallholders supplying nearby factories to minimize the cost of production and improve quality. This will help ensure steady supplies for the regional tea auction and logistics hub that the government is establishing in Dar es Salaam.
Tea is part of a bigger plan. President Samia Suluhu Hassan in 2020 unveiled an ambitious economic agenda, “Vision 2025,” which focuses on boosting crops to help drive GDP growth to an average rate of 8% through 2025, lifting the economy into middle-income status. The plan invests $2 billion in the transformation of agriculture for food self-sufficiency and export. It will develop irrigation, especially in key farming corridors. The government targets floriculture, viticulture, and farming of high-value cash crops like spices, coffee, and tea.
The initiative will encourage 200,000 young people to pursue careers in agritech — a strategic effort to modernize the farm sector by incorporating technology and innovation.
Source: https://stir-tea-coffee.com/features/tanzania%E2%80%99s-tea-transformation/