Idea #384 – Visiting the tea fields in Ceylon
Sri Lanka, first world tea exporter and the fourth world producer, exports almost all of his productions, that is 95 % of 300 000 tons produced annually. The wet and fresh moderate climate in the central mountainous region of the country favors the production of high-quality tea. In the 1840s, the English people acclimatize the first plants of tea plants Assamica, to diversify their sources of supply.
In the 1850s, while the island had dedicated itself until then almost exclusively to the culture of the coffee, a parasite ravages these plantations and directs the local producers to a mass culture of the tea, in great demand and more resistant. During the independence of Sri Lanka in 1975, all the gardens were nationalized, then were re – privatized, sometimes in depends on the quality of the productions. Plantations are identified according to their zones of production: High Grown (teas of height, plantations of which are situated between 1200 and 2200 meters in height), Medium Grown (teas harvested between 600 and 1200 meters in height), and Low Grown. Sri Lankans consider that High Grown is of better quality than the others, but the amateurs of tea are not generally convinced of it.
Some Pictures
Where is it ?
Haputale, Sri Lanka