【聯合報╱By SARITHA RAI╱陳世欽譯】
Modernizing the Tea Market in India
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DARJEELING, India — The tea plantations here in the Himalayan mountains may be the last place to find technological innovation. Many of the colonial-era practices involved in tea-growing and processing still follow the time-honored manual labor and handwritten bookkeeping. But as global consumers become connoisseurs of high-quality products, one entrepreneur is seeking to give the industry a Silicon Valley makeover.
India is the world’s second- largest tea grower after China. Yet, even as the country produces quality specialty varietals that are as highly regarded as wines from France , its industry is antiquated.
With the backing of one of Silicon Valley’s biggest venture capital firms, Accel Partners, Kaushal Dugar, a Singapore- trained financial analyst, is among those slowly bringing the sector into the modern era via his online tea retailing startup, Teabox.
The bulk of India’s production — about one billion of the total 1.2 billion kilograms — is consumed by the domestic market, where brands from the Indian conglomerate Tata and the multinational Unilever hold sway. But the remaining 200 million kilograms is a market ready for shake-up. Technology forms the core of Teabox’s online operations. Algorithms predict demand based on such factors as past sales and pricing. Information about a tea’s picking date and origins is made available to online customers.
Teabox, which was started in 2012, is bringing in wine tasters to provide engaging online descriptions for its products. Gone are the flowery descriptions like “distinctly high-grown character.” They have been replaced by phrases like “light-bodied tea with a slight woodiness .”
All of these steps aim to hook a new generation of customers in countries such as Russia and the United States. As consumers on a quest for the latest niche food products veer toward drinking the brew in upscale salons and tea bars, Indian tea could tap into the global tea market, estimated to be $90 billion in size.
“Tea is a time-sensitive product, but the industry’s supply chain is quite broken and has many intermediaries,” said Prashanth Prakash of Accel India, which along with Singapore’s Horizen Ventures has provided some $1 million in early funding to Teabox. “The business is ripe for disruption, both in terms of price and quality,” he said.
The venture capital approach is helping Teabox change operations. “By employing tactics used by the wine industry, we want to demystify tea and present it in a more accessible manner ,” said Mr. Dugar, 31, founder and chief executive of Teabox, which is based in Siliguri, Darjeeling, the heart of the tea-growing region.
Mr. Dugar returned to India after a few years in Singapore to become an entrepreneur.
He and his backers discovered that the industry has not changed in 200 years. Many plantations controlled by thirdor fourth-generation owners use machines dating back a half-century .
Because of the lengthy auction and distribution process, it can take up to six months for the tea to reach a consumer overseas. “The lack of modern infrastructure leads to tea quality deteriorating and losing aroma along the way,” said Arun Kumar Gomden, a tea industry consultant.
To change that, Teabox set up sourcing centers in Darjeeling and Assam, within hours from the gardens where the leaves are plucked and processed.
Almost as soon as the teas are procured fresh from the production centers, Teabox stores them in temperature- and humidity- controlled warehouses.
Then, within 48 hours, the teas are checked, vacuum-packed and dispatched to fulfillment centers in major markets such as Russia, the United States and Australia.
The company offers highend teas at a discount to established brands like Twinings and upscale European, Asian and American tea salons (Teabox’s products can sell for as much as $1,099 per kilogram).
For instance, a French tea salon called Palais des Thés sells the Mission Hill tea at $340 per kilogram, but Teabox sells the same product about 60 percent less at $126 per kilogram.
Teabox is still a small player in the industry: It has shipped 10 million cups’ worth of tea to customers in 65 countries so far. The challenges are many. Traditional distributors, for instance, have blocked access to plantations .
Regular access to financing will help Teabox ramp up its brand in crucial markets like the United States where tea drinking growth rates are overtaking coffee. The company aims to grow 300 percent to 500 percent in the coming year and cross $1 million in annual revenue.
Mr. Dugar said, “With cash in the bank and support from investors, we can dream about quickly building a billion-dollar tea brand from India, something that has never been attempted before.”
中譯
葡萄牙的失業率或許高達15%，然而這並不意味美國鮮果生產商芮特公司（RAC）可以找到當地的工人，去採摘它在葡萄牙奧得米拉市76公頃農場上的莓果。
去年，該公司展開全國性的人力招募，最後雇用40名葡萄牙人。第一天結束時，就有半數辭職。第一周結束時，在地工人全不幹了。
農場生產經理穆里洛說：「他們想工作，然而這不是他們要的，因為基本上，這種工作太辛苦，待遇也太低。」
農場雇用的1/3人力遠自泰國找來，在全部450名工人當中占了160人。這是成本較高的替代選擇。
農活對葡葡牙人不具吸引力有多重原因，主要是在經濟上意義不大。
農業約占葡萄牙全國經濟總產出的2.4%，人力缺乏問題因為下列因素而更加惡化：葡葡牙法定最低工資太低，勞工仍享有優厚的失業救濟，以及影響不小的形象問題。
奧得米拉市長奎雷洛表示，在葡萄牙，從事農活「給人很不好的觀感。人們大多認為這是往日而非未來的工作」。
32歲的蘿拉‧麥奎里諾已經失業一年。不過她說，即使如此，提高工資她才願去農場工作。她說：「葡萄牙的法定最低工資讓這種工作變得不值得做，因為從事這種辛苦且非常耗時的工作，你幾乎不可能為家人帶來任何收入。
按照780億歐元（約1060億美元）紓困案的規定，葡萄牙政府將勞工領取失業補助的時間縮短近半，成為18個月，目前並正在為雇用額外人力的企業提供社會安全給付豁免待遇。然而這些措施並未對許多葡萄牙年輕人構成足夠的誘因。
專長勞動法令的律師卡妲莉娜‧費雷拉表示，歐盟提供的補助反而減輕重整農業領域並提高其獲利能力的壓力，導致問題難以解決。
在葡萄牙三年前面臨嚴重經濟危機期間，RAC改自亞洲地區引進勞力。
RAC引進泰國勞工必須為他們取得簽證，並證明無法找到本地勞工。此外，RAC雇用一名外勞一年的成本比雇用本地勞工多出將近2000歐元。該公司需為外勞提供回國機票與住宿。
主持RAC葡萄牙業務的加州人羅培茲說，儘管如此，投資的回報還是很高，因為泰勞工作速度很快，而且心細。
RAC讓水果採摘工人享有葡萄牙的法定最低工資，相當於每個月770美元，還為額外產量提供獎金。泰國工人去年每個月平均收入1440美元，比整體平均數高出大約135美元。
今天，葡萄牙籍工人不到100人，其中50人採摘莓果，其餘則是技師或辦公室行政人員。除了泰勞，其他外勞來自東歐或巴西、摩洛哥、尼泊爾等國家。
尼泊爾工人普恩說，吸引許多尼泊爾勞工前往葡萄牙的另一個原因是，工作證取得容易。普恩此前在波蘭的一座養雞場工作。他說：「歐洲北部的收入比較高，不過這裡的待人方式比較平等，也比較沒有種族問題。」
具有化學工程師身分的奧得米拉市議員伯納迪諾說：「在這裡，人人都想當公務員。然而我認識的人沒有一個願意說他們在幹農活。」
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