The National Tea and Coffee Development Board (NTCDB) in association with Trade and Export Promotion Center has planned to register ‘Nepal Tea’ as a collective trademark this fiscal year.

The trademark for Nepali orthodox tea will be registered in the US, Germany and Canada.

Because of an improved quality, aroma, taste and aftertaste, Nepali orthodox tea has been gaining popularity in the international market.

However, due to lack of branding, the Nepali product has been overshadowed by other popular tea such as Darjeeling tea.

The registration of the collective trademark is expected to expand the footprint of Nepali product in the global orthodox tea market. 

Nepali teas have even bagged awards at global and north american tea championships—events where different brands of teas are awarded based on their taste and quality. In addition, the Nepali product has been gaining popularity in Germany, Canada, Japan and South Korea. 

Sheshkanta Gautam, executive director of the board, said they had kept the US, Germany and Canada in priority lists for the first phase. “Based on the soaring demand from these countries, we have planned to step up and register the collective trademark,” Gautam said. 

The government approved the ‘Nepal Tea’ logo on July 13, 2015. It has taken NTCDB more than two years to initiate the process of registering the collective trademark. The use of the trademark in Nepali tea guarantees the organic practices in production process, production environment, processing and packaging of the farm product.

Nepali orthodox tea is one of the exportable goods recognised by the Nepal Trade Integration Strategy 2016. Nepal produces two types of tea—CTC and orthodox. Almost 90 percent of orthodox tea is exported to third countries. 

Nepal’s tea gardens are spread across 28,000 hectares, mostly in the east, and are gradually expanding to the central and western parts of the country. 

These tea gardens produce over 24 million kg of tea per year, of which around 6 million kg are orthodox.

Jhapa is the main tea producing district. Tea is grown on 11,443 hectares in Jhapa district which produces more than 18,000 tonnes of tea annually.

Farmers in Bhojpur, Ramechhap, Baglung and Nuwakot have been drawn towards growing tea in recent years. 

According to NTCDB statistics, tea shipments were worth Rs2.40 billion in 2015-16, up from Rs2 billion in the previous year.