Tea

Abstract

This entry describes the production of tea in the Northeastern and eastern Himalayas. Until the mid-1800s, China was the source of much of the tea on the global market. While tea (Camellia sinensis var. assamica) is an indigenous plant to Northeast India, the expansion of tea plantations in the region was catalysed by the importation of and the experimentation with the China variety of tea (Camellia sinsensis) starting in the 1830s. European-owned plantations were carved out of the plains and the hillsides of the region. Labour indenture expanded in step with plantation formation and enabled the market dominance of Indian tea over Chinese tea. Within half a century of the first colonial cultivation of tea in Assam, British capital had created an industry so big and vertically integrated that much of British demand could be sourced from the British Empire itself. Today, tea is still grown on plantations in the region where workers remain marginalized and dispossessed. Experiences of uncertainty and inequality on tea plantations have been exacerbated by climate crises, a trend that will likely only intensify.