Hunan’s tea garden area has grown to 2.15 million mu (143,333 ha.) with a total yield of 232,000 tons, as was released at the Hunan Provincial Tea Industry Work Conference on Mar. 1, 2017. The industry achieved a comprehensive profitability of 64.8 billion yuan in output value.
Boasting distinctive characteristics, the Hunan tea industry has built its core competitiveness thanks to the following three major advantages.
Firstly, Hunan obtains such complete kinds of tea as oolong, black, white, yellow, green, and dark tea. Famous green tea can be found in almost every main tea production county; dark tea is famous for its production base of Xuefeng Mountain area, Anhua County; the high-end yellow tea “Junshan silver needle” comes from Dongting Lake District, Yueyang City; and with the rise of black tea, the “the Hunan Black Tea” is also becoming more popular.
Secondly, Hunan has upgraded advantages in fine production process, relying on sci-tech and innovative strengths of Hunan Agricultural University and Hunan Provincial Institute of Tea, and with the Xiang Tea Group Co., Ltd. as the leader.
Finally, Hunan plays well in brand-building to win the market. Hunan tea industry has accelerated the pace of brand integration, and strives to build four regional public brands of “Anhua dark tea”, “Xiaoxiang green tea”, “Huhong black tea”, and “Yueyang yellow tea”. It has encouraged and introduced many tea enterprises to attend domestic tea exhibitions, expand overseas market based on the “Belt and Road” Initiative, and extend online and offline marketing, to win a higher reputation worldwide.
