1999 Proves a Season Stellar for Makaibari Teas
Despite Darjeeling’s Worst Drought in 100 years

The 1999 muscatels and second flush teas from Makaibari Tea Estates are proof positive that the biodynamic farming techniques used produce the best possible teas---in good times and bad, announced Swaraj Kumar “Rajah” Banerjee, owner of the 140-year-old estate. “ The second flush was processed earlier this year,” he added, “because the lull between first and second flush was delayed because of rains. Our muscatels have complex notes, with an exquisite nose and the distinct Darjeeling fragrance.” In the coming weeks, manufacture of Makaibari greens and oolongs will be available here in the U.S. through Makaibari’s representative, although in much smaller quantities than usual. Despite the small production, the quality remains extraordinarily high, Banerjee added. Makaibari’s award-winning Silver Tips, will arrive early August. Other 1999 teas available this summer are green fannings and a very limited amount of first flush, which sold out almost immediately. The prediction for the autumnals is for an extraordinary leaf due to the bountiful (at last!) rainfall the area is having this summer following the worse drought in Darjeeling in one hundred years.That devastating blow left some tea estates without much of a tea crop; others have a substantial crop but the teas show little fragrance or taste in the cup. In a few instances, hundreds, even thousands of tea bushes were decimated; slips and landslides have occurred, and in one instance, a landslide was so horrific, it killed nine people.

Banerjee explained that, “Nearly all the negative aspects of an extended drought can be avoided when tea plantation owners use organic or biodynamic techniques; respect their forest areas by allowing them to grow naturally without the rampant deforestation that has raped the once-fertile fields of  Darjeeling. Ironically, it is the very trees that some tea plantation owners have uprooted that would avoid the irreparable harm of slips and landslides which result when there is nothing to “hold on” to the earth when the heavy monsoons fall or when blistering drought occurs.”
 

Since 1945, Makaibari Tea Estates has been committed to growing tea in the most environmentally-sensitive way. Mulching began in 1945, followed by the introduction of permaculture in 1971. However, it was the application of the biodynamic techniques developed by Rudolf Steiner that have proved most beneficial to Makaibari. These techniques, first used by Banerjee in 1991, are credited by him as the reason when his tea bushes suffer less during drought or monsoon, and why their “comeback” time is much abbreviated. “We do have the blessings of geography here at Makaibari,” he said, “but we do not take it for granted. Instead, we give our tea plantation constant, and natural, assistance with these powerful, life-giving biodynamic techniques. One look at our land, even to the unschooled eye, will show a liveliness of the earth that springs back even when dry, a forest teeming with wildlife and plant life, a bounty of the sky with butterflies and birds, and all these synergistic life forces show up in the cup.”

Makaibari Tea Estates was the first tea farm to be Demeter-certified in 1993 and has received this prestigious certification ever since, in addition to a Gift of the Earth designation from World Wildlife Fund’s Living Planet Campaign for the introduction of Integrated forest management to the farm in 1997, and the Organic Food Award from Britain’s Soil Association for the Demeter Darjeeling Tea Makaibari in 1998. Makaibari is certified by both Demeter UK and Demeter USA, registered with TransFair International as a Fair Trade Tea, and is an active member of the Joint Forest Management campaign.
Copyright 1999 BCC

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