Safe Tea Production Situation in the World

Autonomy: The degree to which a system depends on other systems for its survival. Autonomy is defined as the extent to which a system can function normally, using only those resources over which it exercises effective control. Autonomy was first proposed as a characteristic of social systems. However, the concept can be extended to ecosystems. Tropical rainforests, with their nearly closed nutrient cycles, are highly autonomous ecosystems. Coastal estuarine wetlands, which depend largely on the continuous influx of nutrients from other external ecosystems, are low in autonomy. Most agroecosystems operate with constant external nutrient inputs [2].

Cooperativeness is the ability of a social system to make rules for the management of agro-ecosystems and to implement those rules. Cooperativeness is a multidimensional relationship, with most communities being highly cooperative in some activities. Generally, cooperativeness is based on local beliefs and practices. These organizations, practices, and rules are often more idealistic than practical [2].

In addition, in the study of tea growing areas, the author will pay more attention to tea quality characteristics, environmental aspects (pesticides, fertilizers) and markets to ensure full consideration of economic, social and environmental aspects of sustainable development.

1.3. Safe tea production situation in the world

Tea plants (Camellia sinensis L O.Kuntze) are distributed from 45 0 North latitude to 34 0 South latitude. Currently, there are 58 tea producing countries including Asia: 20; Africa: 21; America: 12; Oceania: 3; Europe: 2. There are 115 tea drinking countries in the world including Europe: 28, America: 28, Asia: 29, Africa: 34, Oceania: 5, so tea plants have a large market in the world.

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Currently, the world has about 2.55 million hectares of tea. India is the largest tea producer with 870,000 tons/year, the second largest producer is China with 685,000 tons/year. Sri Lanka continues to increase production to a record level in recent years (320,000 tons, 2002). Kenya ranks fourth with production level.

290,000 tons, Indonesia is 121,000 tons, so the world tea output has reached a record level in recent years, about 3 million tons/year [14].

According to FAO, in the past 20 years, world tea production has tended to increase, tea output increased by 65% (from 1.79 million tons in 1978 to nearly 3 million tons in 1998), most tea producing countries increased their output. One of the largest tea producing countries is China, which doubled its output, Kenya tripled it, India and Sri Lanka are experienced tea producing countries [16].

With such growth, tea exporting countries compete fiercely with each other, in addition to the long-standing traditional competition between tea and coffee and other beverages. Therefore, the world tea export market has many fluctuations. In the past 20 years, Asia's tea export market share has decreased from 72% to 64% in 1998. Meanwhile, Africa's has increased from 22% to 33% in the same period. According to FAO estimates, world tea exports have increased by nearly 2% in the past decade, which is a slow increase among beverages.

To achieve growth in output, countries have applied advances in agricultural science to intensive tea cultivation. The use of fertilizers and pesticides in cultivation has had a significant impact on environmental conditions and human health. In addition, there are world studies on the health benefits of drinking tea, combined with the strong promotion of tea by the FAO on human health, which has created a new perspective on global tea. Customers in developed countries, where health issues are a top priority, have switched to using tea products that are certified to be safe for health and protect the environment.

Safe tea first appeared on the British market in the autumn of 1989 and was sold under the Natureland brand by the London Herb and Spice Company, made from tea grown on the Luponde plantation on Livingstoria Mountain at an altitude of

2,150 m above sea level of Tanzania. The demand for safe tea increases by an average of 25

% per year and it is predicted that by the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st century, it could account for 5% of the total world tea demand. The price of safe tea is 2 to 4 times higher than the price of regular tea. Currently, the world's major tea producing countries such as China, Sri Lanka, India, Japan,

Kenya is focusing on researching and producing safe tea products to meet the increasing demand of consumers [7].

Safe Tea Production in China

China is the country with the largest tea area in the world. In 2000, China's total tea area was 1,106,933 hectares, with a total output of 683,324 tons, including

498,057 tons of green tea, 67,608 tons of oolong tea, 47,294 tons of black tea, 22,558 tons of tea cakes and 47,807 tons of other types of tea. In the 1990s, China paid a high price for unsafe tea products, due to the excessive use of pesticides, chemical fertilizers and lack of attention to preventing pollution in production areas. In recent years, China has been shifting strongly to safe tea production. After 2000, the area of tea planted for safe tea production reached 6,700 hectares, mainly in Zhejiang, Jiangxi, Anhui, Hubei... The total output of safe tea reached about 4,000 tons, with a total production value of about 150 million Yuan. Of which, about 3,000 - 3,500 tons of tea were exported to Japan, the US and Europe, and about 500 tons were consumed domestically. In order to encourage tea production and export, China has issued a decree on tea standards ensuring food safety and hygiene and has support policies such as loans, price subsidies in the first years, tax reduction, etc. In the present and future, tea production ensuring food safety and hygiene is a major priority of the Chinese tea industry [5].

Safe tea production model in Zhejiang province

Zhejiang is a province with a large tea area and output in China. Safe tea production and safe tea in Zhejiang have existed since the 90s of the 20th century, but it has only been taken seriously since 1998. The steps in implementing safe tea processing and production have been carried out by Zhejiang province in a very systematic and correct manner, with a roadmap that is consistent with the overall development of the whole province. First of all, the province has unified the awareness of safe tea production for all sectors and the people. Starting with holding seminars and discussions on tea and tea quality. As early as 1999, the province issued a document banning the use of pesticides with high residues. In 2000, the province built a tea development roadmap with the slogan "Strive to develop safe tea production in the whole province, develop safe tea with conditions", and at the same time effectively propagated it in many different forms. Take advantage of active broker offers,

promote timely awareness of tea hygiene quality for people throughout the province, in order to lay a solid foundation for the development of safe and organic tea in the province [5].

In order to coordinate safe tea production, the relevant agencies have actively cooperated and organized forces to formulate and promulgate safe tea standards and provincial-level safe tea (in 2000), at the same time propagating and thoroughly implementing those standards, promoting localities in the province to start implementing many tea production points in the direction of safe and organic products. Many districts in the province have known how to combine local realities to build appropriate and corresponding implementation processes (for example, Toai Xuong district has adopted the operating process to build a demonstration tea garden for safe production of the entire district and comprehensively promoted the construction of safe tea projects).

Along with the dissemination of information on the construction of safe tea production sites, Zhejiang Province has actively opened many technical training courses on tea. The training program not only guides on safe tea harvesting organized by the Ministry of Agriculture but also participates in information exchange, training, and practice on safe tea opened by the tea industry. There are thousands of people trained on safe tea techniques in a year (for example, in 2000 alone, Vu Nghia District organized 19 training courses with more than 1,200 participants, printed and distributed more than

2,000 technical documents).

Next, demonstration models of safe tea production at the provincial level were built in Tan Xuong, Khai Hoa and An Cac, with Khai Hoa and An Cac districts being listed as exemplary districts in tea production discipline nationwide. At the same time, Zhejiang province has also developed a series of safe tea production enterprises, and by 2001, the entire province had 50 enterprises registered to produce safe tea products with an estimated area of 15,000 acres (1 acre is equivalent to 667 m2). The provincial safe tea production certification agency has granted certificates to 46 establishments, and 4 establishments have been granted certificates by the national authority on safe tea.

To encourage the rapid development of safe tea throughout the province, management levels from province, district, and town all have corresponding support policies with many methods.

different ways. The province's focus is to support districts with demonstration plots and provincial-level safe tea demonstration facilities; while districts and towns focus on supporting safe tea production enterprises with capital, taxes, markets, etc. For example, in Wuyi County, Chengzhou, the government has not only made safe tea production a national priority but also provided specific support of 100-200 yuan/acre for safe tea gardens.

Along with raising the general awareness of the quality of safe tea production, the inspection of hygiene quality is also considered important and ensured to be implemented right from the district and town levels. The province has implemented a program to proactively inspect product samples and samples of households participating in production to grasp the situation of changes in the residue of substances in tea. Thereby, it can be seen that Zhejiang tea has had many changes, creating a solid foundation for the reputation of Zhejiang tea in the domestic and export markets. Continuously from 2001 to now, Zhejiang tea products have been assessed to meet safety standards for export to demanding markets such as Japan and the EU.

Safe tea production in Japan

Japan also pays attention to the production of safe tea grown in the highlands of Kanaguwa, Shiga, Migazaki, Shizuoka. However, it is common in Japan to produce safe tea based on the synchronous control of technical solutions such as mechanization, varieties, fertilizers, plant protection, harvesting, preservation and processing to minimize pesticide and fertilizer residues in tea products at the level allowed by the market. Currently, the Japanese Government invests a large amount of funds in exploiting natural tea products (products that fully meet food safety requirements), many safe tea shops and tea shops without pesticides have been opened. The Japanese Ministry of Agriculture has used the organic agricultural product label for safe tea, in 2001 the Japanese Ministry of Agriculture introduced a Japanese safe tea standard system.

Tea production in Japan is carried out by farmers and private companies. Each tea production household usually has about 2-3 hectares and a processing factory (If calculated according to the tea production capacity in Vietnam, which produces 220 days/year, the equivalent capacity is 12 tons/day). Modern equipment and many production stages have been automated. In addition, tea production in Japan also has other organizations, which are cooperatives.

Tea production is about 40 tea production households, with a scale and area of about 80 - 120 hectares along with a processing factory, managed according to the principle of voluntary and mutual benefit. Production households and cooperatives all produce semi-finished tea and then consume it on the market.

Domestic tea market: through consumption channels in the form of auctions that usually take place at the headquarters of the Tea Agricultural Association, producers bring their products to the Tea Agricultural Association of the region (usually the district) to sell, next to the market, there is a tea storage warehouse of the Tea Agricultural Association that provides tea storage services for buyers and sellers, for tea trading companies, when there is a need for cold storage at 0 0 C, also installing automatic equipment, only needing one person to manage and operate via computer network, the person sending tea to the storage warehouse only needs to come and get the code of the shipment that needs to be returned, the equipment will automatically transfer the correct shipment that needs to be returned to the warehouse door. Tea products are further processed by tea trading companies or beverage trading companies into higher value products such as powdered tea, instant tea, candy, cakes made from tea, etc. These products are consumed in domestic and foreign markets.

The direction and provision of technical services for tea production in Japan are carried out through the Tea Agricultural Association in conjunction with the Tea Research Institutes. For example, the Tea Association installs field observation devices at certain locations (through sensors on the field), the devices automatically collect technical parameters, indicators, humidity, temperature, NPK content every hour and report the collected results to the computer, from the collected parameters, the computer processes and gives directions for fertilizer use, irrigation, and recommendations for tea producers.

Regarding plant protection, based on observation data, investigation, estimation, forecast and recommendation to producers on the process of preventing tea pests and diseases in the form of prevention schedules and specific instructions for farmers on the quality indicators of semi-finished tea (tannin, soluble substances, caffeine, amino acids). When it is necessary to analyze the quality of tea, the Association's department will also analyze and respond according to the request, thus the technical services and domestic tea market are all undertaken by the Tea Agriculture Association, very convenient and accurate. The staffing for an agricultural association is very

In short, the service fee that the Tea Agriculture Association collects through services is about 2% of the value of the products for which the service is provided.

Chemical residues in Japanese tea products are a matter of concern to the government and consumers, but in reality, there are no pesticide residues in tea produced in Japan, due to the cultivation process and growing conditions of tea in this country, tea is only picked 3-4 times a year, with an interval of 1-2 months between each picking, so the pesticides in the tea have all decomposed. The Japanese love to drink tea, so the domestic production is not enough to meet the demand of the domestic market. Therefore, tea growers in Japan do not have to worry about tea consumption.

Safe Tea Production in India

Bombay Burmah Company with an area of 2,822 hectares, annually produces about

8,000 tons of finished tea meet safe tea standards. The company has been researching safe tea production since 1988 at the Oothu plantation surrounded by forests. During the cultivation process, no chemical fertilizers, pesticides, stimulants, or herbicides were used. The cultivation method for high productivity is to use dry oil compost to fertilize the tea. Earthworms are also widely used to quickly decompose organic matter, increasing soil fertility, and legumes are intercropped between rows of tea. Currently, India has about 10 tea companies producing safe tea, of which there are up to 312 hectares of safe tea.

Comment:

In general, currently, the governments of China, Sri Lanka, India, Japan, Kenya, etc., along with their non-governmental organizations, are actively developing safe tea to capture the market. Due to the increasing demands of consumers, many tea-producing countries in the world have paid special attention to safe tea production and are moving towards safe tea production to meet the demand in the world tea market. The direction of safe tea production is based on the synchronization of technical solutions such as mechanization of varieties, fertilizers, plant protection, harvesting, preservation, and processing to minimize pesticide and fertilizer residues in tea products at the level allowed by the market. Find varieties that produce early buds, adjust bud picking techniques to ensure bud quality.

Focus mainly on spring tea harvest, accounting for 50% of the annual output, with high quality and few pests and diseases.

The system of fertilizer and pesticide management is strictly controlled through the agricultural associations of localities closely linked to the product consumption market. For the direction of safe tea production, many countries in the region have built a scientific standard system from air, water, soil, heavy metal residues, pesticide residues in soil, in tea, selecting and planning areas, building ecological areas, tea area management techniques (Quality management within safe tea areas; Establishing factories specializing in the production of fertilizers, biological pesticides for safe tea production; Establishing safe tea research agencies, management agencies, inspection agencies recognizing safe tea at national level).

1.4. Safe tea production situation in Vietnam

Tea production and trading situation in Vietnam

Over the past 10 years, the Vietnamese tea industry has made remarkable progress in productivity, output and processing. In 2001, the average tea yield nationwide was only 4.5 tons/ha, but by 2011 it had surpassed 7.5 tons/ha with 133,300 hectares of land specializing in tea cultivation. The number of tea processing factories has also increased rapidly, from 230 factories to more than 450 factories with processing capacity increasing from 3,000 tons/day to 4,600 tons/day.

The amount of exported tea accounts for 80% of the output while the domestic demand for tea consumption has hardly increased, or even decreased. Currently, Vietnamese tea has been exported to 110 countries and regions in the world, of which 3 countries have achieved a turnover of over 10 million USD: Pakistan, Russia, and China. However, over the past years, the export price of tea has always fluctuated erratically. In the period 2000-2003, the average export price of tea in our country remained at over 2,000 USD/ton, in the period 2004-2005 it skyrocketed to 3,000 USD/ton (among the highest prices in the world), but from 2006 to now it has plummeted to the lowest level in the world. [18]

In general, Vietnam's exported tea products are not highly appreciated in the world market because of low quality, many defects, excessive toxic residues due to unreasonable use of pesticides and chemical fertilizers, polluted water sources, etc. Therefore, the export price of Vietnam's tea is always lower than the price of domestic tea.