South America the Ethical Tea Partnership (ETP) Takes from Which Our Members Buy Tea,” Says Another Big Step Forward with the Launch of Partnership Chairman Katy Tubb
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THE NEWSLETTER FROM THE ETHICAL TEA PARTNERSHIP FOR TEA PRODUCERS AND OTHER STAKEHOLDERS TalkingTea November 2005 Monitoring begins in South America The Ethical Tea Partnership (ETP) takes from which our members buy tea,” says another big step forward with the launch of Partnership Chairman Katy Tubb. “To date its monitoring programme in South we’ve monitored over half of the estates on America. An engagement programme with our Approved Supplier List in seven tea the tea trade in Argentina and Brazil began producing regions.” at the beginning of November along with Gavin Bailey - the distribution of questionnaires to selling Do ethical issues matter to consumers? ETP’s New Executive Director marks who supply Partnership members. Yes! In many countries they are very Monitoring begins in these two countries in important, which is why Ethical Tea Dr Gavin Bailey joined the Partnership February 2006. Partnership members need to be able to in May 2005 following Chris Pinfold’s demonstrate that the tea they sell is retirement. As ETP’s Executive The next stage will be to monitor in China responsibly produced. Spending on Director, Gavin is responsible for the and South India, which will begin in mid ethically sound foods in the UK increased monitoring programme and the 2006. “We’re keen to cover the whole of to £1.75 billion in 2003 against £1 billion in development and expansion of the our members’ supply base as soon as 2000. 80% of those surveyed said the initiative. possible and the objective is that by 2008 choice of which groceries they buy is Gavin is new to the tea industry: he’s monitoring will have started in all countries affected by ethical issues (Source: Grocer Magazine UK, April 2004). been involved in policy and Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) The Partnership is already programmes for two of the UK’s major recognised as being highly retailers, Sainsbury’s and Safeway. He successful and in the long also helped to set up and run several term we hope that it will international monitoring and assurance become the one ethical schemes for good agricultural practice sourcing initiative used including the UK’s Assured Produce throughout the tea industry. Scheme and EUREP. Membership is currently “For me, it’s clear that our degree of open to any tea packing success will depend on how we work company selling tea into together with producers to find creative Europe, North America, and practical ways to solve problems Australia and New Zealand. that may initially appear insoluble and perhaps politically too hot to handle,” he says. “Debate is an important part Stop Press… Stop Press… Stop Press… of this and we want to use this newsletter, which will appear every six months, as one forum for exchanging Tazo joins ETP views and airing opinions. The Ethical We are delighted to welcome Tazo (www.tazo.com) as a Tea Partnership is a constantly member. The Tazo brand, which includes 21 flavours of filterbags, 15 flavours of ready to evolving initiative and we want our drink teas, four flavours of tea lattes including Tazo Chai, is sold in the US and in Canada. stakeholders, particularly tea Limited offerings of Tazo products are sold in Starbucks stores throughout Asia, Europe, producers, to tell us where we can Central and South America and Australia. The Ethical Tea Partnership now has improve so that we can make this a 18 members (see below) covering over 50 brands of tea sold in over 30 countries. real partnership.” A Monitoring Visit Close-Up Charles Wambua, an experienced monitor with the Kenyan PricewaterhouseCoopers monitoring team, walks us through an initial monitoring visit. “In Kenya PricewaterhouseCoopers has a documents, payroll information and team of 16, some of whom have worked on employee records on the day so we give a ETP monitoring for the last three years. list of the records we need to see and ask While not everyone has a background in for confirmation that these will be available. tea, over this time we’ve carried out a large We also ask the estate to complete a short number of monitoring visits and built up profile so we have a general understanding considerable experience of the tea industry, of its scale. how tea estates work and the issues they face.” We also explain that we will need to talk to staff including management, payroll clerks, Kenyan monitors Dennis Njagi and a colleague check records The Partnership’s social monitoring process employees and Trade Union Officials and to on an estate. Dennis has just won PricewaterhouseCoopers’ entails visits to individual tea estates’ see every part of the tea estate and factory, Monitor of the Year Award 2004-5. selling marks to make sure that producers including the accommodation areas, formal comments which are also comply with the respective national legal sanitary facilities, tea fields, medical documented. All this information is framework and other legally binding local centres and school. included in the monitoring report which is agreements. compiled by PricewaterhouseCoopers in On the day… Kenya then sent to their London office for The areas we focus on are: We start our visit with an introductory quality review prior to sending to the ETP I Terms and conditions of employment meeting with management. This gives us in London. I Education, focusing on the individual’s another opportunity to explain what ETP is right to education about and why it’s important to take part. ETP will review the report, grade it and We cover what we’ll be doing, the things I Maternity provisions send a copy of the final report with the we need to see and the people we need to grade to the estate. A time frame for any I Health and safety talk to. We also explain in more detail ETP’s remedial actions needed will also be I Housing graded certification. included.” I Basic rights, which include freedom of association, employment freely chosen Then we begin to gather evidence, through and no harsh and inhumane treatment a combination of observation, interviewing skills and checking of records. We interview Your feedback It’s not all checking: the monitoring process the tea estate/factory manager, tour the also seeks to identify aspects of good factory facilities and the other parts of the is important management practice, recognising estate and interview employees and the Trade Union representatives. We look at the After a monitoring visit the producers who have moved beyond the Partnership sends each estate a short basic legal requirements in areas such as estate’s documentation e.g. payroll, water environmental conservation, education, certification etc. Monitoring Visit Evaluation Form. This provision of health care and local is your opportunity to tell us what you community engagement. At the end of the visit, we prepare close out thought of the process and the minutes and report back to estate management. This meeting gives us the monitors’ approach. This information Each monitoring visit in Kenya is carried is used by PricewaterhouseCoopers out by two trained and experienced chance to discuss any non-compliances PricewaterhouseCoopers monitors, one of we’ve found and also any aspects of good and ETP to continuously improve our whom is usually female. The length of the practice. It’s a two-way process and gives monitoring process. visit varies depending on the size of the us the opportunity to get management’s estate: an initial visit lasts two days, a follow up visit takes a day. If we’re doing a follow up visit, we try to make sure that at least one member of the original monitoring team is involved. Spreading the word Before the visit We try to do as much advance planning as Feedback from tea producers has We’ve been considering how best to meet possible to make sure the visit runs indicated that they feel there is a need this need and have decided to appoint our smoothly and on time. We go through the for better communication and a closer first in-country representative based in questionnaire the estate has completed for relationship with the Ethical Tea Kenya. “The aim will be to build strong ETP so that we are familiar with the Partnership. There are sometimes relationships with key partners and information already given. A month before questions that need to be answered and stakeholders, both inside and outside the the visit we send the estate a pack of issues to be resolved and it’s hard to do tea trade,” says Gavin Bailey. “We want to information which explains the process this when the Partnership is a long build a spirit of openness with tea we’ll be going through. It’s very important way away. producers and a real willingness to work that we are able to access all the relevant Graded You ask…we answer… ETP is an evolving initiative and we know provide hygienic toilet facilities in a location it’s not perfect. Your feedback and that is convenient to the workforce. Certification comments can help us to refine and improve. Below are some of the issues that In terms of applying a grade, we would ETP introduced graded have already been raised and we look categorise the non-availability of forward to receiving more of your permanently built toilets in tea fields as a certification to reflect the questions via our dedicated email address minor non-conformance, so it does not fact that each estate is at a for tea producers: adversely affect the overall grade an estate different stage of [email protected] is given to a great degree.