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All efforts to prevent made tea from absorbing moisture will be wasted if proper care is not taken in packing. Apart from the fact that tea chests must conform to a certain standard, the lining of the tea chests should be moisture proof and free from taints and strong enough to withstand transportation without damage. The tea in the chest should remain fresh during its transit from the estate to the consumer market. A certain amount of moisture absorption can not be avoided during transit, but that should not exceed 0.5% when the chest is opened at its destination.

Tea Chest Materials

Tea is packed in either reddish or pale plywood chests. The former kind appear to be brittle and close to 85% of damaged chests belong to this category. It is found that pale plywood chest do not sustain as much damage during transit.

Lining of tea chests

Aluminum foil and tissue papers are used as well as from the taint of the plywood box . Tea keeps equally well when packed in plastic materials. But it must be thick enough to avoid any puncture from the abrasive effects of the tea particles themselves.

Size of the chests

The size of the tea chest varies according to density of the tea as well as the method of transit. To facilitate the modern system of ex porting in pallets to the UK and other such markets, tea is packed in chests of 40x 50x 60 cm or 40x 40x 60cm.

The usual sizes of the chests are:

For very tippy teas - i.e, tea that originates from buds -small chests are used, but the net weight is maintained above 25 kgs.

Lately, however, due to the growing shortage of plywood and other wood products, paper sacks and jute bags are increasingly being used for packing tea.

Source: Tea Technology, Gokul C. Sarma, P. Eng.