In India, we have a vast indigenous knowledge base which can offer solutions to pest control. This should then be combined with a holistic ecological farming approach that improves soil health, plant physiology and rebuild biodiversity. The conventional approaches towards sustainability currently are farm centric, and are focused on improving individual micro ecosystems while the wider region and the ecology remain mired in conventional chemical intensive practices hence hampering the growth of micro systems created.
The journey to document plantations, which truly stand out as beacons of hope in the abyss of the chemical treadmill, has taken us from the hills of Darjeeling to the plains of the Terai and the Dooars and across the Brahmaputra into the Bodo Territorial Administration region, to Meghalaya and finally down south to the Nilgiris. The stories shared in the following case studies talk about tea growers, their perseverance and techniques they have adopted to make the tea they grow, truly sustainable.
These cases studies are not at attempt to compile a definitive list of alternative pest control techniques used on tea in India but they do tell stories of success, restored biodiversity and prosperity from regions where pests and chemical usage have impoverished thousands of farmers.