TEA FROM CEYLON.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 243, 14 October 1935, Page 9

TEA FROM CEYLON.

HOW IT IS GROWN. A PROFITABLE INDUSTRY. HAPPY PLANTATION WORKERS Half a million pounds of tea from 700 acres .i*id a clear profit of £25,000 was quoted to-day as a year's return from a Ceylon tea plantation. The speaker was Professor Arnold Wall, formerly Professor of English at Canterbury College, who addressed a luncheon meeting of the Auckland Rotary Club. Such a wonderful return, the speaker said, had not been made in recent years. The return quoted had been made in 1928, and since that time the tea industry, like most others, had had its troubles. Tea-growing was not an old-established industry in Ceylon, said Professor Wall. Ui> till 50 years ago the main occupation had been coffee production. Then had come an insidious disease, which in a few years had wiped out the coffee plantations, and the planters as a consequence had turned over to tea. The tea tree was very much like a camellia tree and had a yellow fiower. There were many varieties of the plant, but the one which, had been chosen and accepted as stanI dard was the Assam indigenous. Very special climatic and topographical conditions were necessary to the commercial success of the industry. An estate lie had visited was over 4000 feet above sea level, in a latitude near tlie equator, and the rainfall in the tea growing areas was from 100 to 140 inches per year, and in some places as much as 200 inches. Tea had been grown as high up as (iOOO feet, where there were light frosts, and under those conditions the best quality was obtainable. Ceylon was one of the most beautiful countries in the world, and tlie surroundings of the tea plantations —jungle and streams —were grand enough to satisfy the most aesthetic taste. Cultivation of Plants. Describing tlie cultivation of tlie tea plants Professor Wall said that about 500 were planted to the acre. Tlicy had to be regularly pruned and were kept about three feet high to permit of easy plucking. Cultivation was laborious as weeds grew most profusely, and at' least every ten days every yard had to lie weeded afresh. The work was carried out, not by the Cingalese, but by Indian coolies, the Tamils, who provided what was probably the most efficient and reliable labouring service in the world. Men were paid 9d a day, and women nl, and they worked 10 hours a day without a break, including Sunday. They seemed to be perfectly happy and contented. Despite the small wages the workers made effective use of their savings, the women being lavishly adorned with rings and other ornaments, all of solid gold. The coolies lived and worked under strict regulations, and there an as full provision for repatriation and for education of tlieir children. And there were trade unions. In its early years the tea plantations had been privately owned, but nowadays they were mostly in the hands of big companies. Life in Ceylon, concluded the professor, was delightful, and tlie Englishman, could find all the necessary opportunities for recreation, but it lia- 1 . one very marked drawback. The climate and other surroundings made it unsuitable for the bringing up of an English family and after children had reached the age of three or four years it was considered necessary to send tliem out of the country for the remainder of their childhood and youth. As an industry there was little likelihood of the establishment of teagrowing in this country, although the speaker had seen in the Mount Eden district a tea tree apparently about 29 years old.