The Tea Plant
Tea plant in the field
Tea is an evergreen plant of the Camellia genus. Its scientific name is “Camellia Sinensis) and it originated in China, Tibet and Northern India. The tea plant has thick leaves, dark green in color, and a strong thick stem. The tea flowers bloom in white or pink and have a delicate fragrance. There are about 200 different species of the tea plant around the world.
Consdering that after water, tea is the most popular beverage in the world, you would think that we would know how to make a cup of tea. Tea is well known to provide many health benefits: boosting your immune system, building bone density, protecting against heart disease and cancer, even eliminating bad breath. However, over processing or over brewing the delicate tea leaf strips away its natural oils and antioxidants, essentially killing the leaf – and all of the health benefits it can provide.
If you want to have your tea (and drink it too) we at Herbal Republic believe that the only tea to drink is whole leaf tea. Cutting the leaf or over brewing the tea lets the natural oils of tea to evaporate and leaves the tea tasteless.
Our teas are purchased through our membership of The Ethical Tea Partnership. Www.ethicalteapartnership.org. The Estates we source and buy our teas from are monitored by the ETP to assist the Estates in making improvements, equipment safety and the use of protective clothing, water and washing facilities. There are improvements in employment procedures and informing workers of their rights. Improvements in working hours and overtime.
This is our way of reaching back to the pickers who are picking the leaves that are found in our customers cup.
Our membership of the ETP allows us to work hard for our producers and pickers and helps us to “give back” to our Estates.
We will continue to work to build for our farmers through our membership of the ETP.
