When we started Kazi Yetu, we travelled to incredibly lush tea plantations across Tanzania to learn about the opportunities and challenges in starting a tea business. What we found was that there is a high potential with the terrain and range of altitudes in tea growing areas, and so we dove in. We thought to ourselves: great, it’s a stable value chain that is scalable and impactful, allowing us to focus on processing, blending and packing. However, as with many value chains in agriculture and in Africa, there are challenges across the board – from seed to plant to harvest to processing and finally to transport.
Tea Sector in Tanzania
Tanzania’s tea sector is focused mostly on production of black tea due to the historical investment in machinery for black tea processing rather than green tea. The difference between the two is that green tea is steamed, so requires an additional equipment or machinery for this. In Tanzania, out of the 14 tea processing companies, only 3 have historically had the capacity to process green tea. As Kazi Yetu is working to transform the tea sector in Tanzania, we have collaborated with each of these three companies to make beautiful green tea. However, there are still many challenges for them that are beyond our control, such as lack of maintenance of the machine, low capacity of team to operate these machines, and low investment or interest in making green tea due to lack of understanding of market opportunities. We continue to work with them to address these, but for now we have come to realize and accept that there is currently no green tea available in Tanzania that meet our quality and volume requirements.
Searching for Alternatives
However, we do not want this to affect our efforts of impact, quality, and growth. As an alternative, we have searched for an organic, ethical sourcing tea partner in our neighbouring countries and found a beautiful estate in Rutsiro, Rwanda that produces high quality organic orthodox green tea. We will now blend these green teas from Rwanda and continue to support the growth of Tanzanian teas. We are excited to source from an estate and factory that reflects the values of Kazi Yetu!
Our Way Forward
Our quest for green tea in Tanzania has not wavered. In fact, our efforts are multiplying – we are starting a new tea value chain development project together with CARE International (financed by Bloomberg Philanthropy, who has supported the fair trade coffee industry in Rwanda for several years). We are engaging with the Tanzania Smallholder Tea Development Agency and the Tea Board of Tanzania to work with high-potential cooperatives that are owned and operated by smallholder farmers in Tanga, Njombe, Iringa, and Mbeya. The aim of the project is to improve productivity, invest in green tea and orthodox tea production, and redistribute the economic gain down to the cooperative and farmer levels, especially targeting women.
Stay tuned on our quest and thank you for following our journey!
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