Ties of Tea between Ningbo and Georgia

Georgia on the Black Sea that spans Europe and Asia did not produce tea until the mid 19th century. Officially it started in 1893 when Liu Junzhou and his people from Ningbo began building a tea farm there.

In 1884, a Russian professor made a report at an international symposium held in St. Petersburg on gardening and plants, discussing the possibility of large-scale tea cultivation in Russia. It was determined that Georgia might be turned into a place for this ambition. Popov, a Russian merchant, was appointed to work together with the royal land administration. Professors and experts were sent to India, Ceylon, China and Japan for field studies. They proposed that Caucasus, Georgia was the ideal place to have tea plantations.

At first Popov bought tea seeds from Hubei, a province in central China, to start tea plantations in Georgia. The seeds did not grow well. The seeds from India, Ceylon, Japan did not fare well either. Now was tea processing was satisfactory either. It occurred to Popov that the success of introducing tea cultivation to Georgia would not depend on tea seeds and technology, but on the people with technical know-how. As he had been buying large quantities of tea from Ningbo, a port city in eastern China’s coastal Zhejiang Province, Popov believed the tea from Ningbo was of the best. So when he came to Ningbo in 1888, he decided to visit Ningbo Tea Factory.

Ningbo Tea Factory was a joint venture between Liu Junzhou and his partners. Popov stayed for two months in Ningbo and came to know Liu pretty well. Popov invited Liu Junzhou to go to Georgia and start a tea plantation.

Liu hesitated. He was married and he was running a flourishing business in Ningbo. He did not go. In the following years, Popov came to visit him a few times. It was not until 1893 that Liu agreed to go to Georgia and said he needed some professionals to go with him to make sure that the project would be successful. It was agreed that Liu Junzhou and ten other tea technicians would spend three years in Caucasus. In the summer of 1893, Liu and the ten technicians left Ningbo for Georgia by sea. Going with them were several thousand kilograms of tea seeds and tens of thousands of tea saplings.

The ship went across East China Sea, South China Sea, the Strait of Malacca, the India Ocean, the Red Sea, the Suez Canal, the Mediterranean and the Black Sea. In November 1893, they reached Georgia. After a field study, Liu decided upon a site for a tea plantation near Batumi. The Chinese planted tea saplings and started a farm to grow saplings from seeds. It was Russia’s first ever large-scale tea plantation and it measured 80 hectares. The Chinese also built a small tea processing factory there. When the first contract term expired, Popov said those who wanted to stay could go back home for a visit and come back later. Commissioned by Popov, Liu Junzhou came back to Ningbo. He recruited new technicians in Ningbo, purchased more tea saplings and tea. In May 1897, Liu and 12 tea professionals from Ningbo arrived in Batumi.

This time, the project moved to a new site in Adjara, about 12 kilometers from Batumi. With Liu as the project manager, local Georgians were hired to build the new plantation. The tea saplings from Guangdong Province of China proved to perform quite poorly in the new area near the Black Sea. Liu experimented and developed a new species. By 1900, a new tea plantation of 150 hectares and a tea processing factory were built.

Liu Junzhou later wrote in a book about Georgia’s tea cultivation. He commented “Despite the wet climate in Georgia, tea produced there could be better than the medium quality made in Ceylon. I firmly believe that there is a bright future for tea industry in Batumi”.

Liu Junzhou also proposed to set up a government school where those who wanted to run a tea farm could study free of charge.

In 1901, Liu Junzhou was appointed to a position in the Russian royal land administration. He was put in charge of starting a new tea plantation for the royal house. For nearly ten years, Liu worked there developing the whole tea production procedure exactly according to the procedure used in Ningbo. The tea produced there turned out to be excellent. In 1909, the Caucasus governor inspected the tea plantation and met with Liu Junzhou. In 1910, Liu was awarded a medal for his contribution to the tea industry in Georgia. While working for the royal house, Liu Junzhou also started a new sapling farm and a tea processing factory in a suburb of Batumi. In 1918, Liu and his workers defended the factory when Batumi fell to the occupation of the Turkey troops. Liu had been from a military family. Under his leadership, his people at the factory repulsed the attacking Turks and kept the assets in tact. Liu Junzhou later wrote proudly that the tea factory was the only enterprise that was intact coming out of the civil war in the Soviet Union.

Liu Junzhou and technicians from Ningbo continued to work on tea plantations in Georgia after the Soviet Union came into being. Liu Junzhou spent 30 years in Georgia. On November 13, 1924, Liu was awarded a Labor Red Flag Medal by the Soviet Union. In 1924, Liu and the technicians came back to China. Liu Junzhou spent his evening years in Ha’erbin, the capital city of Heilongjiang Province in northeastern China. He passed away in 1941.

The tea industry in Georgia has kept growing. The data in 1957 indicated that Georgia had 63,000 hectares of land dedicated to tea cultivation, making it the largest tea producer of the Soviet Union.

Liu’s residence in Georgia has been turned into a Chinese Tea Museum in honor of Liu and his team from Ningbo. It displays a photograph of Liu Junzhou and his brief autobiography.