About Us
Supporting
72000
Growers
Our
Story
- Launched on 4th April, 2019
- Initiative of Solidaridad and the Indian Tea Association (ITA)
- Improved livelihood of 72000+ small tea growers
TRINITEA focuses on a continuous improvement model to support farmers through tailored farm management practices and access to real-time information on climate, soil, and the market. It is ideally placed between the archetypal certification programs at one extreme and standard extension service projects with farmers at the other extreme. The certification models have adopted IT-based training and traceability systems, and introduced several smallholder-friendly standards. However, they do not allow for sustained engagement with the farmers for their long-term growth. TRINITEA addresses this gap with its self-assurance model that provides technical support to small tea growers, expanding their opportunities.
TRINITEA
Organizational Structure
A Transformation
in the Making
TRINITEA aims to transform the tea smallholder segment in India sustainably. The tea smallholders are emerging as a predominant tea segment in India, contributing to more than 50 percent of the total production in the country. TRINITEA seeks to enhance the competitiveness of the Indian tea smallholders.
It focuses on empowering them to choose the best practices for their soil or crop, and assure their produce based on conscious and meticulous actions, and keen decision-making.
trinitea
Secretariat
Shatadru Chattopadhayay is a doctorate in South Asian Political Economy and received his education at Delhi University and Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. Shatadru has been involved in numerous CSR projects, public-private-partnerships, sustainable supply chain solutions & developments and landscape-solutions in remote corners of Asia for the last 20 years. He has crafted and steered 10 globally recognized national and international sustainability standards, their scheme rules and audit protocols in six sectors. He was instrumental in developing country-specific CSR standards and consumer communication logo for tea in Asian countries and for conceiving and setting up several stakeholder-engagement models.
Dr. Shatadru Chattopadhayay
Managing Director, Solidaridad Network Asia
Ranjan Circar is a Tea professional with almost 3 decades of hands-on experience in the plantations. Thereafter, as Regional Country Head for India, he served for 6 years with the UK-based Ethical Tea Partnership (ETP), managing their sustainability agenda. Since 2013 he has been working as Global Lead for Tea with Solidaridad.
As a sustainability practitioner with a deep understanding of the sector, he leverages and elevates strategic opportunities and identifies key risks and mitigation approaches in consonance with a team of Tea experts. Additionally, his role involves building consensus across the Tea sector and developing appropriate and coordinated responses through co-creation of innovative programmes/projects. The scope of his work addresses challenges related to differentiated market channels, poverty, food security, climate change and depletion of natural resources.
Ranjan Circar
International Programme Coordinator-Tea, Solidaridad
Ramanand Tiwari has been working for the program management and monitoring of social-development programs for the past 17 years. He has addressed several health and socio-economic issues of primary healthcare, HIV/AIDS, digital and financial literacy, youth and sustainable development. He has worked for various national and international organizations viz. HelpAge India, American India Foundation Trust, MAMTA-Health Institute for Mother & Child and Global Development Network before joining Solidaridad. He has been managing Solidaridad’s programs on sustainable transformation of Asian tea sector for the last seven years. As a sustainability practitioner, he coordinates a range of sectoral transformation activities in collaboration with a team of Tea experts. His role involves developing appropriate and coordinated responses and solutions for the industry, related to linkages with the market, poverty, food security, nutrition, health, climate change, and natural resources.
Ramanand Tiwari
Project Coordinator-Tea,
Solidaridad
Gangan. Boriah, joined Solidaridad in January 2005 after finishing a long tenure of 12 years with UPASI Tea Advisory Service and 27 years with Tea Board of India. While in service with UPASI as the Advisory Officer, he gained in-depth knowledge and practical experience on tea plantation management. In Tea Board, he held the position of Director of Tea Development and also served in numerous roles like Secretary of National Tea Research Foundation, Member of Agriculture Skill Council of India, Project Co-Ordinator of CFC - FAO-Tea Board Organic Tea Development project, Chairman of Consultative Committee of Common Fund for Commodities, Amsterdam (CFC) and FAO Working Group on Organic Tea development, all of which have afforded him a wealth of experience
Gangan Boriah
Senior Advisor-Tea,
Solidaridad
The ITA also serves as the Office of the Consultative Committee of Plantation Associations (CCPA), an Umbrella Body of all tea producing Associations of North and South India. As the Secretary General of ITA, Mr. Raha is also the Secretary General of CCPA. The ITA leads industry initiatives on advocacy, policy formulation, industry level IR negotiations and welfare initiatives for the growth and development of the tea industry. In his career spanning over three decades with the ITA, Mr. Raha has championed several initiatives for the growth and development of the tea industry. He is also the co-founder the TRINITEA framework that is empowering over 60,000 small tea growers in India to remain sustainable.
Arijit Raha
Secretary General & CEO, Indian Tea Association (ITA)
Arjun heads the operations of TRINITEA South India. An alumni of the Allahabad Agricultural Institute, Uttar Pradesh, India, Arjun essentially belongs to a small tea growing family in the Nilgiris, South India. Prior to Solidaridad, he has managed and led corporate tea gardens in South India for 25 years. Arjun has been a part of the founding teams of several sustainable tea programs in India.
V M Arjun
Program Head, South India operations, Solidaridad
A tea planter/administrator/consultant with over 46 years’ experience in the industry. Amongst his endearing memories has been his grass root connect with the small tea growers and he feels it is now time to share the knowledge and experience gained in the past. He believes that the small tea farmers are a vital segment in the Indian tea scenario and they need all the support they can get to achieve sustainable improvement in yield & quality, become an intrinsic part of the supply chain and acquire better access to the markets. Additionally, in a fast-changing environment, the need of the times is to help resurrect a diverse ecosystem in order to arrest the dangers of climate change. These are a few of the areas where he is helping to make a difference.
Rajat Dutt
Senior Consultant-Tea, Solidaridad
Immediately after doing Post Graduation in Tea Husbandry & Technology from AAU almost three decades ago, Mokshadev joined in a corporate tea house where he inculcated management skills. Working in the tea industry, he has observed a number of issues cropping up in the last three decades. The emergence of tea small holder segment is considered to be a driven force in tea economy. Transformation of this segment in India while taking care of the social and environmental issues to enhance the competitiveness of the Indian Small Tea Growers needs a movement and he believes TRINITEA is doing that.
Mokshadev Das
Program Manager,
Solidaridad
The TRINITEA programme is jointly governed by the Indian Tea Association and Solidaridad and aims to sustainably transform the tea smallholder segment in India. The TRINITEA Secretariat is based out of the Indian Tea Association office at Royal Exchange, 6 Netaji Subhas Road, Kolkata 700001. The secretariat receives supervision from a multi-stakeholder tea industry forum (TRINITEA Program Committee).
- HO, New Delhi
- Kolkata Centre
- Indian Tea Association
- State Coordination
- District Coordination
Dr. Shatadru Chattopadhayay
Ramanand Tiwari
Ranjan Circar
Gangan Boriah
Krishan Katyal
Arijit Raha
A. Ganesh (Assam and West Bengal)
Arjun V M (South India)
Rajat Dutt (North Bank of Assam - Udalguri district)
Uddhab Sharma (South Bank of Assam - Dibrugarh district)
Tazdiq (South Bank of Assam - Jorhat district)
Mokshadev (South Bank of Assam - Tinsukia district)
Digvijay Jamwal (South Bank of Assam - Tinsukia district)
Rohin D’Souza (North Bengal)