Assam Tea
Listed under Industrial in Silchar, India.
Assam tea was first exported to Britain in 1836 when, after a lengthy argument, it was agreed to be superior to the then popular Chinese tea. By the mid-19th century, when tea-processing became mechanised, the industry was booming.
It is now the most widely-consumed tea variety in the world and what is more, the conditions under which it is picked and processed are no longer as exploitative as they were in the Victorian times, with an increasing number of small, independent farms taking a share of the market and engaging in fair trade projects, though many of the workers on the larger plantations are still poorly paid.
Most Assam tea is now grown in the southern Barak Valley and in the Upper Assam regions. A visit to one of the tea estates is both an education and a delight; begin your day with a 'banbati' bowl of fresh tea and a wander through the cool, aromatic tea fields and spend the afternoon learning how the tea is processed and how the industry began and developed from the tea workers themselves.
Unlike the dismal, dusty offerings we can pick up in UK supermarkets, the real Assam article tastes malty, earthy, dusky, rich and very distinctive.
Written by 
larapiegeler.
Other expert and press reviews
“Assam: India's little-known land”
By Trevor Fishlock for The Telegraph. First published September 12 2008. ...I flew from Calcutta to the tea town of Dibrugarh and stayed nearby at Mancotta, a handsome tea estate house dating from the 1840s when the British were annexing Assam in pursu… Read more...
Written by press. See the full article in The Telegraph, 12 September 2008
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