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By Staff Writer<\/p>\n
Due to excessive tea import, lack of incentives for domestic tea producers and a systematic corruption, many of Iran\u2019s tea gardens are about to be destroyed, with the rest following suit if no change in the situation is going to take place.<\/p>\n
While it\u2019s been years now that Iran\u2019s tea growers have been dealing with different problems, Hassan Rouhani\u2019s government is yet to address any of them, causing tea producers to eventually change their tea farms\u2019 land use, cultivate another crop or even sell their farms altogether.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe quality of Iranian tea has significantly deteriorated over the past several years. Besides, the total area under tea cultivation has also reduced from 34 thousand hectares to below 20 thousand, causing many tea workers to lose their jobs,\u201d says head of Tea Growers Association of Northern Iran in his interview with state-run ILNA news agency on July 13, 2018.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere was 34 thousand hectare of tea farms in northern Iran until a few years ago. But due to officials\u2019 negligence, the figure has now reduced to less than 20 thousand, so that there\u2019s now only 15 thousand hectares of cultivable tea farms left in northern Iran, with the rest being either out of service or having their land use changed for building villas and houses.\u201d<\/p>\n
The conditions of tea factories<\/strong><\/p>\n This is not tea growers alone who are going through miserable times due to regime\u2019s wrong policies, but northern Iran\u2019s tea factories are also suffering a similar situation.<\/p>\n \u201cNearly 50 percent of tea factories in northern Iran have changed their land use, causing many tea farm owners, tea growers and tea factory workers to lose their jobs, with many of them immigrating to marginal areas of big cities and earning their livelihood through peddling or even beggary,\u201d says head of Tea Growers Association of Northern Iran in his interview with state-run ILNA news agency.<\/p>\n He then points to decreased number of tea growers in northern Iran, saying \u201cabout two million people used to work in northern Iran\u2019s tea farms and tea factories until a few years ago. But the number of people involved in cultivation and harvesting tea has now reduced to less than 100 thousand.\u201d<\/p>\n Meanwhile, board chairman of Tea Growers Association of Gilan Province\u2019s District Five believes that \u201cIran\u2019s tea problems began in 2000, and the situation has deteriorated ever since. Mazandaran\u2019s tea farms have dwindled to 20 percent of their initial area and Gilan\u2019s are also gradually diminishing.\u201d (Stae-run ILNA news agency, April 10, 2018)<\/p>\n The situation in Gilan and Mazandaran has caused 50 percent of the tea farms in the two provinces to be abandoned, with most of them having their land use changed by regime officials for making villas.<\/p>\n Predatory policy of excessive tea import<\/strong><\/p>\n One of the main factors causing the destruction of northern Iran\u2019s tea farms, and subsequently farmers\u2019 lives, is the country\u2019s excessive tea import carried out by the government and regime affiliated traders, so much so that 120 thousand tons of tea is imported every year, with the profit going right into the pockets of regime affiliated importers.<\/p>\n The Central Bank\u2019s recently released list of companies that have received subsidized foreign currency from the government shows that more than 60 companies and state-linked entities are involved in importing tea using the subsidized 4200-toman US Dollar they receive from the government.<\/p>\n Moreover, there are still other companies, including car importers, that have received foreign currency at subsidized rates to import tea, tea makers and coffee makers, despite such products being totally irrelevant to their field of business. Rahrovan Khodro Pishgaman Negin Jonoob is one of such car importing companies that has received 134 thousand Euros for importing tea.<\/p>\n That\u2019s how the country\u2019s excessive tea import causes the Iranian tea growers to lose their jobs, their homes as well, and join the country\u2019s army of jobless and marginal dwellers, while Iranian tea, which used to be of highest quality, has to gather dust and go bad at warehouses.<\/p>\n By Staff Writer Due to excessive tea import, lack of incentives for domestic tea producers and a systematic corruption, many of Iran’s tea gardens are about to be destroyed, with […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":51758,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[178],"class_list":{"0":"post-25058","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-economy","8":"tag-save"},"yoast_head":"\n![](\"https:\/\/www.ncr-iran.org\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2018\/07\/Irans-Tea-Farms-on-the-Verge-of-Destruction-5.jpg\" "\\"Irans-Tea-Farms-on-the-Verge-of-Destruction-5\\"")
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