Organic tea plantations
The tea farmers who abandoned conventional farming methods were all people with the courage to follow their own convictions, and therefore did not fear to go against the grain. Tea farmer Yu Sanhe, head of the seventh tea production and marketing group in Pinglin, and Huang Bojun, founder of Taiwan BlueMagpie Tea, both had the same courage and enthusiasm.
“I don’t grow tea, I just maintain the environment.” Yu Sanhe, who started to apply natural farming methods in 2010, brings out some recently harvested and processed winter tea and says, eyes shining, “Since I shifted over to organic farming, not only have I protected the environment, I have been able to get a rich harvest of precious winter tea.”
Yu explains that when he first went over to eco-friendly tea growing, besides a drop in production, his biggest headache was “infections from neighboring plantations.” “Four or five years ago a neighboring farmer said unthinkingly that the only way he could get the leaves on his tea bushes to grow was to spray pesticides three times per growing season. I realized that he was using so much pesticide that the insects were all driven into my plantation, so it’s no wonder that my tea was all eaten up.” To address this problem, Ye did not harvest his tea in August, but deliberately waited until after his neighbors sprayed their pesticides in September, so that his tea leaves would be old and therefore unpalatable to the insects driven over into his plantation. Then he waited again for new buds to form in October, which was precisely the time to harvest winter tea.
The difficult days that Yu went through, when reduced production caused him to operate at a loss, so that he could only get by with the help of loans from the farmers’ association, have ended in sweetness. He is understated and persevering, just like the tea he makes—especially his white tea and yellow tea, in which the light infusion has a powerful sweet aftertaste.
In the more than 1000 hectares of tea plantations located high up in the catchment of the Feitsui Reservoir, spread across Pinglin and Shiding Districts, more than 90% of growers still use conventional methods, and their long-term overuse of chemical fertilizers and pesticides has led to acidification of the land and to concerns about accelerating eutrophication of the reservoir. Besides Yu Sanhe, there are some 30 tea farmers in Pinglin’s organic-only seventh and eighth production and marketing groups who are working hard to restore eco-friendly tea cultivation, and so to moderate the damage being done to the Feitsui Reservoir by conventional farming methods.
There is also Huang Bojun, founder of Taiwan BlueMagpie Tea, who since 2013 has used the concept of “river basin recovery” to convince 14 tea farmers to join the ranks of those who do not use pesticides or chemical fertilizers.
Huang uses “eco-friendly” as a branding tool, and promotes marketing techniques like corporate sponsorship and travel to tea growing areas, working through companies with a sense of corporate social responsibility and through consumer participation to together do whatever they can on behalf of environmentally friendly tea drinking.
Drinking tea is a reconstruction of natural local conditions, and also a kind of life aesthetic and attitude. When we practice conservation and environmentally friendly cultivation techniques in mountain tea plantations, nature rewards us with a truly revitalizing cup of tea.
Because he avoids using chemical weedkillers, tea farmer Ye Renshou must weed by hand, taking special care to clear away rapidly spreading vines.
Tea masters use their experience to judge the proper amount of time for withering of the leaves, as just the right degree of dryness can improve the tea’s flavor.
Pan-roasting tea, and rolling the leaves by hand between roasts, changes the fragrance and shape of the tealeaves, giving the tea a greater depth of flavor.
Taiwanese tea expert Tsai Yi-tze not only teaches the aesthetics of the tea ceremony, he has also made it his mission to train people in applying conservation practices to mountain tea plantations.
A good cup of tea can connect people with people and people with nature.
Plant diversity is the clearest evidence of an eco-friendly tea plantation.
Tea farmer Yu Sanhe, who practices natural farming methods, says he doesn’t “grow” tea, but merely maintains the environment.
Organic tea farms in Pinglin do not use chemical weedkiller, so you can see glossy green grass growing below the tea trees. (photo by Jimmy Lin)