Tanzania Tea Authority
Tanzania Tea Authority (TTA) was a government organization founded in Tanzania in 1968 that controlled the cultivation and marketing of tea. The predecessor was the Tanganyika Tea Board , a subsidiary of Brooke Bond Africa Ltd .
Tea cultivation began in Tanzania in the Tanga region at the beginning of the 20th century. To this end, the German colonial rulers founded a research station in Amani. It was not until 1926, now under British occupation, that there was significant income: By the time Tanzania gained independence in 1960, tea production increased to 3700 tons (salable goods). The Tanganyika Tea Board was the amalgamation of the tea plantations that were exclusively operating at the time.
With independence, tea cultivation was entirely in the hands of foreign corporations and colonial settlers. In the course of the 1960s the market was opened and small farms were added. In the 1963/64 season, 330 hectares were already being cultivated by so-called “smallholders”.
The main task for the Tanzania Tea Authority was the provision of land, the planting, the training and the processing of tea for the small farms. In 1992 there were almost 30,000 holdings, each with an average of 30 ares of arable land. A total of 9,000 tons have now been produced. In 1990 the country produced a total of 19,000 tonnes on a total area of 18,000 hectares. The Tanzania Tea Authority was responsible for running smoothly in the Tanzanian tea market, which, together with Zimbabwe, was third in Africa.
Three quarters of the acreage is located in the so-called southern highlands of the Iringa region . There is the following distribution of the tea market:
| region | Operating Company | Further processing | Production (to / year) | Acreage (ha) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mufindi | Brooke Bond Tanzania Ltd | Lugoda , Kilima , Kibwele | 6644 | 3152 |
| Mufindi | Mufindi Tea Company Ltd | Itona | 1617 | |
| Njombe | Luponde Tea Estates Ltd | Luponde | 380 | 2482 |
| Njombe | Tanzania Tea Authority | Luponde | 973 | |
| Rungwe | Tanzania Tea Authority | Mwakaleli , Katumba | 2180 | 4036 |
| Tukuyu | Tukuyu Tea Estates Ltd | Msekela , Chivanjee | 2099 | 1530 |
In 1968 the government passed the Tea Ordinance Act, in which Chapter 291 regulates the transformation of the Tanganyika Tea Board into the Tanzania Tea Authority . In particular, smallholders were given special benefits. Until 1997, an extensive reorganization took place within the Tanzania Tea Authority , in which the tea industry was restructured and the statutes were changed by the government through the resolution “Tea Act No. 3 ”was canceled. Instead, the Tea Board of Tanzania (TBT) was set up for industry and the Tanzania Smallholders Tea Development Agency (TSHTDA) for smallholder entrepreneurs .