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STiR coffee and tea 69 ENCOTECC Inc. USA +1 239 443 5074 Canada +1 514 800 2473 Europe +49 211 7311 5151 info@encotecc.com Irakli Gurchumelia is the owner of Bio Universal Georgia, a tea exporter based in Tbilisi Boxes of Georgian green tea for sale at the Megrul Lazuri restaurant along the Black Sea resort of Batumi "Some apparatchik in the Kremlin decided that Georgia was supposed to grow tea because the climate was appropriate," he said. "It was assigned tea as a division of labor. Georgian tea had no free-market value because it had a guaranteed buyer." Yakobashvili, a critic of the current government in Tbilisi, says efforts to revive the tea industry are rooted more in nostalgia than in the real world of supply and demand. "Wine is a traditional Georgian product cultivated in traditional areas, but most of the wine we were selling to the Soviet Union was not real wine; it just had a label, and we suffered the consequences. Since the Russian market has collapsed, the wine indus- try has suffered serious losses, so we've directed the whole wine market to the West." Pretty much the same, he said, happened with tea. "We started using combines during Soviet times, but if you really want to produce high-end tea, it has to be hand-picked. Otherwise, it won't work," said the former dip- lomat. "It comes down to this: how many people are ready to spend half a day under the sun picking tea leaves? In Soviet times, you could impose it. But the Soviet Union is long gone, so do you really have a potential market?" Irakli Gurchumelia certainly thinks so. He's the owner of Bio Universal Georgia, a company formed in Armenia in 2007 by Gurchumelia's partner, Tigran Saakian. "Our tea is oriented mainly for the Georgian market," he explained during an in- terview in Batumi. "When the Soviet Union collapsed, the tea industry was destroyed as well. Unfortunately, during the last 15 years, all the tea has disappeared, but now they're reviving the industry. Even the government is helping farmers invest additional money, in some cases giving grants to improve the plantations." Operating under the Manna Tea label, the company produces eight types of herbal tea using leaves imported from Sri Lanka. It also has a Los Angeles-based division known as Tanan Import Export Inc. "Our target market is mainly Europe and the United States," he said. "We don't sell the tea in Georgia because everybody in Georgia drinks plain tea, not with herbs. And we know that organic tea is a little more expensive than ordinary teas." But come September, the company will start sourcing its teas from Guria in west- ern Georgia; its products will be rebranded as Manna Artisan. "Before, all the tea came from Sri Lanka and India," he said. "Some herbs, like thyme, chamomile and mint, we can buy in Georgia, The problem is that we produce organic and non-organic as well, and it's quite difficult to get organic herbs in Georgia." In 2015, the company's US sales generated $200,000, while its sales in Germany came to €80,000 (US$89,000). But next year, it will triple production, said Gurchumelia, noting that locally sourced Georgian tea is about 40% cheaper than importing tea from Sri Lanka. Kakha Nachkebia (left) and Valeri Vadachkoria pluck tea leaves at the Nagomari plantation situated at 3,675 feet (1,120 meters) above sea level