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Zimbabwe commemorative stamp from 1985 featuring its tea.
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Tea plucking in Zimbabwe.
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A farmer in her tea field in Zimbabwe.
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Serving tea at Tanganda.
Ahead of a trip from Assam, India to Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe, sometime in 1924, Florence Phillips packed a box of seeds. With her husband, Grafton and his friend Arthur Ward, they wound up their long journey in Chipinge, a wet, mountainous area in the east of Zimbabwe near the border with Mozambique.
Grafton and Ward planted the seeds, irrigating them using water from a river, Tanganda, that flowed, and still does, through their farm, New Year’s Gift. Ninety eight years on, the name of the river now identifies an iconic brand of a range of teas that not only dominates the local market but is also a force to reckon with on the world stage.
“Our tea has been welcomed by the world since the first sample was sent to Kolkata [India] and London in 1928," Henry Nemaire, managing director of Tanganda Tea Company told STiR Coffee and Tea. “It is top quality tea with a long, illustrious history.”
As they grew their operation, in 1930, the two friends established Ward and Phillips (Pty) Ltd and cultivated 3.5 hectares of tea. The success of the venture attracted a prominent local investor, the Meikle family to put their money in the company which was renamed the Rhodesia Tea Estates Limited. Much later the Rhodesia Tea Estates Limited changed its name again to Tanganda Tea Company.
For 30 years, Tanganda was the only tea company in the country until four other private companies joined - Southdown Holdings and Eastern Highlands Plantations Ltd (EHPL) in Chipinge, Aberfoyle Plantations in Nyanga, north of Chipinge, and Ariston Holdings. In the late 1960s, the parastatal Tribal Trust Land Development Corporation, renamed the Agricultural and Rural Development Authority in 1980s started tea growing and processing too, also in Nyanga.
In March 1964, the first tea ever grown by African farmers in the country was delivered to EHPL which had initiated an out-grower scheme involving blacks. Southdown Holdings and Tanganda Tea Company were encouraged by that success so they launched their own out-grower projects.
Chipinge and Nyanga lie in Zimbabwe’s best farming region with rich soils, a minimum annual rainfall of 1,300 mm, low ambient and soil temperature and high humidity.
Tanganda is the largest producer, packer, and distributor of tea in the country, commanding around 50% of all local output. New Year’s Gift, the enduring monument of Zimbabwean tea maintains that name since 1924, but is now a mixed operation. In addition to tea the group also products coffee and macadamia nuts, which a herd of about 300 cattle and wildlife such as vervet monkeys, baboons, and blue duiker roam around.
According to Tanganda’s 2020 financials, tea production was 9,188 tonnes in that year, 10% over the prior year harvest of 8,319 tonnes. Its yield per hectare is around four tonnes, one of the highest globally, according to Nemaire.
“We beat the world in that as well,” he said referring to the efficiency of the company’s tea production.
Ariston, which produced 2, 582 tonnes in 2020, down from 2,985 tonnes in 2019, is listed on the Zimbabwe Stock Exchange. Meikles Limited, Tanganda’s parent company, announced in July last year a plan to unbundle the tea unit and get it separately listed on the same bourse.
According to MarketResearch.com, a US market intelligence entity, Zimbabwe’s tea market, calculated in retail prices, was equal to US$201 million in 2015 but is poised to grow.
“Until 2025, the tea market in Zimbabwe is forecast to reach US$275.56 million, thus increasing at a compound annual growth rate [CAGR] of 4.42% per annum for the period 2020-2025. This is an increase, compared to the growth of about 1.39% per year, registered in 2015-2019,” it said.
“The average consumption per capita in value terms reached US$13.05 per capita [in retail prices] in 2015. In the next five years, it declined at a CAGR of -0.93% per annum. In the medium term [by 2025], the indicator is forecast to increase at a CAGR of 2.26% per annum.”
Zimbabwe, Africa’s eighth biggest growing nation behind Kenya, Malawi, Uganda, Burundi, Tanzania, Mozambique, and Rwanda mainly grows Debra Par, SF150, SF108, and SF 11 varieties.
“The SFs are on demand globally,” said Misheck Dembaremba, a farmer. “We put cuttings in pots and they shoot there. They stay in the nursery for 18 months after which we plant them in the open field. Picking is normally at four to five years but if the crop is handled well a farmer can start picking at three to four years. With Debra Par, we do cuttings as well. That tea type does not shoot in winter. It is a good type for the farmer because it is heavy so it is easier to have a bigger tonnage than other teas if someone grows it.”
The country picks between 18,000-19,000 tonnes of tea yearly. Of that yield, about 4,000 tonnes is consumed locally and the larger proportion of bulk leaves is exported to the UK, South Africa, the US, and other markets.
“Our tea has a body, which means it has a strong taste whereas that which is farmed elsewhere tends to taste watery,” said Nemaire. “Because of its strong taste, local tea is much sought-after in many countries for blending with teas of different quality from other regions. Kenya, because of its volcanic soils is good as well. So yes, the biggest selling point of our tea is that it has a body.”
While the local beverage is produced mainly by Tanganda, Ariston, and EHPL, small-scale producers working as out-growers continue to play a role since the history-making delivery to EHPL by four farmers in March 1964.
However, deliveries and viability declined in recent year because of low producer prices and unreliable rainfall. For example, in 2004 they picked five tonnes, one of the biggest harvests in history but thereafter, output dramatically fell. There were only 1.8 tonnes in 2917 and 1.2 tonnes in 2019 according to official figures.
The number of out-growers has been falling as well, said Charles Sanhanga, national chairman for the tea commodity association in the Zimbabwe Farmers’ Union, the country’s largest growers association with more than one million members. In Honde Valley, in Nyanga north of Tanganda, there were 1,200 farmers growing tea in 2004 but there are only 500-600 growing the crop now.
“Farmers are just in it because tea is a perennial crop which can be harvested multiple times,” Sanhanga told STiR Coffee and Tea. “Were it not for that, they would have dropped tea and focused on alternatives like macadamia, bananas, and others that pay better. In fact, farmers now grow other crops, not just tea. Prices are too low and farmers don’t have a say on how they are arrived at. The company just imposes.
‘Farmers are saying if they are supported to be able to acquire small processing plants, potential is high that they can be competitive again,” said Sanhanga. “They will be able to pack and distribute their tea, instead of selling it for almost nothing to companies that go on to make much money out of it. Processing plants such as those operating in India and China and are suitable for 5-10 farmers cost US$20, 000. But with the money we are being paid for tea, it is impossible that we can raise that sum.”