On 24th April, the project of Tea quality and safety, and the key technologies for standardized production in tea plantations, a National Science and Technology Support Program implemented by the Tea Research Institute (TRI) of CAAS, passed the appraisal by the Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST).

The scientists involved in the project proposed the new technologies for seriously acidic soil improvement, digital information management of tea plantation and the plant bush management. Furthermore, the team has developed expert systems for seriously acidic soil management, geographic information system of tea plantation, and integrated pests prevention and control system based on several microbial pesticides developed by the project and other biological and physical control methods. The project established ecological and efficient standardized production technology procedures for major types of tea production in different ecological conditions. The project has also developed an integrated tea fluoride control technology, rare earth control technology, and tea quality safety traceability system based networking technologies.

Back in the historical lane of success for the past three years of implementation, the project has obtained three scientific and technological achievements and a registered green manure crop specialized for intercropping in tea fields, two registered bio-pesticides, and two new devices for determining broken tea bulk density and fresh tea leaf fluorine concentrations. To make the work simple, the project team has developed three computer software copyrights, which are, Chinese Tea Geographic Information System V1.0, and three authorized patents including a qualitative detection method of tea geometrid nucleopolyhedrovirus. The team went further in establishing eleven technical regulations. Of which one has been promulgated as a local standard, two have been submitted as industry standards, and four have been approved by China Tea Industry Technology Innovation Strategic Alliance.

To ensure the information is well shared, the research team published 59 scientific papers including six SCI and two academic books. To ensure sustainability the project trained five doctoral students and fourteen masters students, conducted 76 various technical trainings nationwide and trained 7,656 tea extension technicians and key tea farmers. The project established 26 core demonstration sites covering the area of 18.8 thousand hectares to promote tea standardized production technology in Zhejiang, Hubei, Fujian, Guangdong, Hunan, to mention a few provinces. The project has managed to get an economic benefit of 526 million yuan.