Alice is a farmer from Makomboki, Kenya. She has been working in the tea industry for 30 years and makes the majority of her income selling green tea leaves. She picks with her family all year round and is able to employ casual workers during peak season.
Mokomboki landscape. The area under tea is 1742 hectares with a total of 16,389,667 tea bushes.
Jane is a farmer from Makomboki, Kenya. She has 3 acres of land that she uses to grow tea or income generation along with vegetables for her families consumption.
Young light green tea leaf is can be picked every 7 days. Farmers rotate the areas they pluck so they can pick tea everyday.
A factory workers monitors the large quantities of green leaf as it starts the withering process.
First the green leaf is withered in large troughs with hot air to reduce the moisture in the leaf.
A factory worker fuels the boilers with green fuel.
Makomboki Tea Factory in Kenya has taken climate change mitigation measures to reduce the amount of firewood used to fuel the boilers. It now uses cheaper greener fuel made from biomass briquettes along with sawdust and cashew and macadamia nut husks.
Biomass briquettes.
Through donors, Living Earth Foundation UK provided Makomboki Tea Factory with a briquette press machine where they are able to produce their own biomass briquettes which are used to fuel their boilers. This has reduced energy tremendously and saved tens of thousands of trees from being cut down to serve this purpose.
ried tea s checked for grade and quality
95% of Makomboki's tea is exported worldwide.