Many British blends include tea from Assam, where people get poverty wages, are scared to speak up and have no way out. The big British brands know this but aren’t doing enough to challenge it.
Traidcraft’s campaign calls on the big UK tea brands to publish their list of suppliers from Assam.
“Twinings have become the second big UK tea brand to publish their list of suppliers from Assam – a key demand of our campaign. This follows on from Yorkshire Tea’s decision to publish their list in June. Together Twinings and Yorkshire make up nearly one-third of the UK tea market so these are significant steps forward.
More than seven thousand people have sent in ‘Who picked my tea?’ postcards and taken our online action targeting the big 6 UK tea brands. This has spurred the brands into action to publish their lists of Assam tea estates in full.
We now need to push the remaining four – PG Tips, Tetley, Typhoo, and Clipper – to do likewise so that British consumers and tea workers in Assam know where the big UK brands buy their tea from.”