However critics complain that while buyers for western markets only want to buy certified tea they rarely offer to pay a premium for it. While UK consumers are happy to splurge on coffee, the same is not true of tea. The average price of a teabag is “just 2 or 3p” despite the fact that the cost to grow and pick tea is increasing, according to a recent Fairtrade Foundation report on the subject.

I’m going to need more info on these’ critics argument, because these statements by themselves don’t pass the “sniff test”. A company buying tea for resale won’t pay anything more than they need to. If their customers are demanding certified sourced tea, then the company will source that. The way customer demand this is if they stop buying your tea because it doesn’t have certified sources.

If a tea company could make just as much money buying cheaper non-certified tea and they’d retain all their customers and continue with their projected growth, they wouldn’t buy certified tea.