Malawi TEA 2020 - Living Wages Project

A brilliant initiative ensuring stability in the lives of the tea growing community, the Malawi tea 2020 partnership brings together organizations that help in changing the tea industry to a more profitable and competitive one. Tetley ardently supports the Malawi tea growers’ strive for sustainable livelihood and consequently aids this Ethical Tea Partnership (ETP) led program

The program continues to deliver a variety of benefits and to improve the value chain relationship while making the industry more competitive.

Despite the various challenges faced by such sector-wide programs, the Malawi Tea 2020 continues in its vision of making progress on living wages. The UN Business and Human Rights Forum with Oxfam, in 2017, had recognized this initiative as an exemplar for efficiently integrating progress on human rights and Sustainable Development Goals.

The Farmers Field Schools along with Village Savings and Loan groups are special interventions that are part of the Malawi Tea 2020 program to help tackle social disparities.

The Farmers Field School, led by ETP, is a year-long practical peer to peer learning program to help smallholder farmers. ETP research records that farmers who are enrolled in this program are able to achieve higher leaf quality and an average increase in yield by 18.5% during the high season. This increase in income could make the difference between sending a child to school or not.

The Village Savings and Loan groups help make small incremental savings and access the benefits of microfinance. The small loans can help individuals pay school fees or set up a side business as an income boost, which shall be particularly helpful during the off seasons.

To read more about Malawi 2020 program click here