Let me respond with a broad wash to the picture as far as China is concern. Here I have first hand experience. I have heard stories from various other tea production countries. Their problems may be different.
Although there is an NGO in China helping smaller farmers to get international organic certification, it is more like a government agency than a real NGO. In China, traditional folks do not like to muddle with the government; and for good reasons. The reasons just got stronger and more in the China today. As a result this entity seems to be serving more larger corporations who have more other relationship with the government.
It seems to me that these people are promoting more the Chinese alternatives of organic certs and more production set up that are larger in scale get the Chinese certs than international certs.
As far as I can witness, Chinese certs mean little.
There are medium size corporations helping their suppliers who are smaller farms to get international certs, but these are rare. I know of only one in terms of tea. They care more about marketing the cert that they pay for than the quality of tea.
Having said that, however, most larger tea farms that are not certified organic, and that I have visited are pretty okay in terms of going by government pesticide regulations. It is the pesticide companies that are the real problem. They use ingredients that do not match the label. Some tell trusting farmers lies.
Smaller farmers are quite diversified in organic practices, even within the same region. Those who have a long tradition in tea production and especially in higher quality tea usually go by traditional practices of organic farming (they had no such special term as organic). One key lies in planting the trees more apart and various vegetations around them. Less plucking and controlled use of fertilizers (even organic ones) are key to maintaining tree health. These are not possible even in corporate control organic farms because of the need for return.
Those who have joined the tea trade recently only for the opportunity are generally not as disciplined. They can be farms of various sizes.
Marketing of organic tea to most farmers is more a wholesalers’ or retailers’ problem than the farmers’. For those who produce lower quality tea, the extra margin for the cert goes only to the traders. For those who produce higher end tea, the cert is not a decisive factor of their sales. There is no relationship between tea quality and organic certification.
The consumers are obsessed with this “organic” label because some people have successfully promoted it. For real connoisseurs, it is a superficial marketing means, used mostly for teas that are otherwise much, much lower in value.
