Lessons from the tealeaves

In a global grocery economy, it’s easy to overlook how our food arrives from farm to fork. Don’t get me wrong, I love treating myself to Chilean raspberries in land-locked Chicago during the winter or, for that matter, out-of-season guavas in Delhi during the summer. But I do I like contemplating where my food comes from. (Plus, I’m a dorky management consultant who’s borderline aroused by discussions of sourcing.)

Let’s start with chai—or tea, as non-India-dwellers and non-Starbucks-addicts call it. I visited Munnar, a former British hill station in south India, to walk through its emerald tea plantations. For miles, the landscape is a sea of stubby, lush shrubs packed so closely together they look like one giant specimen. They reminded me a bit of vineyards, but without the pretentiousness. Tea pickers there work for $3 a day. It's a decent wage in India, especially when combined with subsidized housing and schooling provided by plantation owners. After all, 400 million people in this country still earn less than $1.25 per day.

So the next time you’re drinking chai, think about where it came from. The tea in your cup may very well have come from green Munnar.