The Barbote tea farm is nestled in the steep hills of Ilam, Nepal, planted by his grandfather and tended by his father but grower Narendra Kumar Gurung spent most of his working years with the Japan International Cooperation Agency. Like most of Nepal’s new-generation farmers, specialty tea is a new endeavor built on a century-old foundation of commodity production.
A lack of infrastructure, a lack of capital, natural disasters, a pandemic, and a very tough competitor at the border – are the challenges faced by Nepal growers. The Nepal Tea and Coffee Development Board report that very few (3,244) of the three million employed in Nepal’s tea industry work full-time. Seventy-four percent of temporary workers are women, according to the Central Bureau of Statistics. There are 18,180 small farm owners, in stark contrast to India’s vast tea plantations and the social complexity of such systems. The farmers can either process the tea themselves or sell the raw leaves to factories.