video record
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Description
This programme looks at the international trade in tea as a case study of one mechanism which connects the developed world with the producing countries of the third world. How is the trade organise...d, who controls it, and what are the changes taking place in the industry today? This programme includes documentary material on tea over the past few years and moves on to examine the structure and future of the industry through the eyes of three people who have made a considerable study of the industry: Sir Percival Griffiths, who has a lifelong association with India and is the author of several books on the tea trade, Dr. Sri-Pathmanathan who has studied conditions on tea estates in Sri Lanka and Mr. Martin Gill of the London Tea and Produce Co., an expert on tea marketing.
Metadata describing this Open University video programme
Module code and title: D302, Patterns of inequality
Item code: D302; 11
First transmission date: 03-08-1976
Published: 1976
Rights Statement:
Restrictions on use:
Duration: 00:48:01
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Producer: Graham Turner
Contributors: M. L. Gill; Percival Griffiths; David Potter; R. Sri-Pathmanathan
Publisher: BBC Open University
Keyword(s): Economic development; India; Inequality; Sri Lanka; Tea
Footage description: Archive film of Port of London in 1921 as Potter introduces the programme. Excerpt from film series "British Empire" as the narrator outlines the birth and growth of tea industry, from planting to tasting. Potter interviews Griffiths, who has recently written a book on the tea industry. Griffiths describes some of the early problems - lack of suitable work force, bad transport. He also describes the managing and financial structure. Over a graphics sequence, Potter describes what happens to the tea on arrival in Britain, and points to the gross inequalities in the trade. A long extract from John Percival's television series "Rich man, poor man" is shown. This begins by looking generally at the tea industry in Sri Lanka and the Tamil work force. An individual tea-picker's life is described in some detail, her wages, living conditions and her views on life. Percival's film follows the tea through processing to selling and looks at the lifestyle of a successful Sri Lanka tea broker. Potter briefly mentions the political uproar over the appalling conditions on the tea estates. Potter discusses with Dr. Sri-Pathmanathan, who took part in Percival's film, what could be done to improve the tea workers' life - union organisation, nationalisation etc. Griffiths describes what happened in India after independence in terms of better conditions, wages and government involvement etc. He also discusses the growing change to local Indian control. Griffiths goes on to describe the Indian attempt to change the tea brokering system. Gill looks in depth at the changes in the marketing side of tea - the growth of supermarkets, the challenge of coffee, the switch of power from tea company to retailer etc. Potter sums up, and asks Griffiths and Gill for their opinions on the future prospects of the tea industry. Credits.
Master spool number: 6HT/72113
Production number: 00525_2286
Videofinder number: 192
Available to public: no