THE HISTORY OF TEA IN TURKEY
The first attemption for tea growing was made in Bursa in 1888. The tea seeds had been brought from Japan. Unfortunately, the attemption ended in failure. The ecological  features of district weren't unfirt for tea growing.

First Tea Nursery Garden

1924, The tea seeds were bought by Russia and the first  Turkish tea nursery garden set up in Rize by Zihni Derin and he went back to his job that he was a teacher İn Istanbul. But fortunately  no one interested with tea until 1937 when Zihniderin came back to Rize. 70 tones tea seeds were imported  from Russia from 1937 to 1940. The production of tea in Turkey was initiated in the early years of the Republic in the east of the Black Sea Region. After successful results had been obtained, Tea Law enacted in 1940 allocated the region extending from Araklı to the Soviet border to tea agriculture.

The first productions

The first black tea was produced in Fidanlik Workshop, 1939-1946,  whose capacity was one tone per day. The other similar work shops were:
  • Uzunkaya Workshop, 1942-1946
  • Gundogdu Work shop, 1942-1949
  • Cayeli Workshop, 1945-1949
In 1947, the first tea factory was opened in Fener district in Rize. Its capacity was 60 tones per day.
 Zihni Derin
1880 - 1965

And then...

Tea agriculture in Turkey is carried out in a sheltered microclimate facing the sea and surrounded by theCaucasus and Kaçkar mountain ranges. Tea is planted along the Black Sea coastline, from the border of the Georgian Republic to Trabzon - Araklı and Rize - Karadere, reaching in some places 30 km inland and reaching the height of around 1000 m, and also in the region extending form Araklı to the Fatsa town of Ordu. Our tea gardens are grown from seeds. Such cultural precautions as maintenance, pruning, fertilisation and harvesting are carried out in conformity with scientific techniques in order to obtain a fresh tea product conforming to the production few countries in the world that does not use agricultural pesticide chemicals in the raising of tea.
The tea production, purchase, processing and marketing functions that were originally carried out by the TEKEL General Management were transferred to the Tea Institution in 1971 (law no. 1497). The institution had started operation in Rize in 1973, and was converted into a publicly owned company in 1983, and renamed the “Tea Processing General Management” (ÇAYKUR). On 4th December 1984 with the law no. 3092 the right to process, package and market tea to persons and company was recognized to Çaykur. By 2001, Çaykur owned 46 green tea processing and 3 packaging factories, while there were 186 private factories.

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