PG has made friends with Rainforest Alliance

Q1: What is the Rainforest Alliance?

Answer: The Rainforest Alliance is an independent NGO that works with individuals, communities and companies whose livelihoods depend on the land to reduce environmental impacts and increase social and economic benefits. Rainforest Alliance pioneered the practice of setting standards and certifying well-managed forests nearly 20 years ago, and developed comprehensive principles and standards for sustainable agriculture shortly thereafter.

Rainforest Alliance works with a number of crops, including tea, coffee, bananas, wood, and chocolate. For more information, please refer to

www.rainforest-alliance.org

Q2: Why did PG tips choose to partner with Rainforest Alliance rather than other ethical  certification schemes? Answer: We explored all possibilities for certification of our tea supply. After careful  consideration however, we decided that Rainforest Alliance’s approach is the most appropriate one – mostly because of its comprehensive nature, looking at the social, environmental and economic aspects of sustainability and its experience in converting crops that depend on larger plantations like tea. It has the ability to help move the whole tea industry.

Q3: Why is only 50% of the tea certified?

Answer: We're working towards being fully certified by 2010, but given the volume of tea involved, we have to take a step-by-step approach. It is simply impossible to inspect and certify all suppliers at once. In order to maintain consistently high quality, PG tips Tea is a blend. This means that a single tea bag can contain tea from up to 20 different plantations. Some of these plantations are already certified, and some still have to be inspected.

Rainforest Alliance started certifying tea plantations in mid 2007. Already 50% of the tea we use for PG tips Tea comes from certified plantations. An inspection and certification plan is in place for the remaining estates.

Q4: Will it change the taste of PG tips Tea?

Answer: Nothing will change. We take great care to make sure that the same high quality and taste is delivered consistently to our consumers. We have asked our main suppliers to become certified by the Rainforest Alliance to ensure that we will be buying the same high quality tea we buy now. In other crops, Rainforest Alliance Certification™, due to its emphasis on the growing and production process, has often led to an increase in quality of the crop produced by certified farms.

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