Have a cuppa, and spare a thought for tea workers

Human Rights Magazine

The cost of tea for consumers is really low, given the volume of tea that is grown, half of it produced in China by some 80 million people.

But it is workers in places like South Asia that have significant problems, where there is a long history of worker exploitation dating to colonial times. Tea workers throughout the region suffer from widespread child labor, gender discrimination, and wage theft because they are usually low caste and poor.

Throughout South Asia, workers on many plantations say that they can barely afford food, let alone other expenses, while those who run the plantations say their costs have risen too much and that they are not making a profit as it is.

In this episode of Human Rights Magazine, Chloe Friedland discusses the challenges in tea farming with several experts.

Photo: Tea plucker in Sri Lanka’s Western Province. ©ILO/Alan Dow

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