The history of tea-growing in Australia is as convoluted as it is cosmopolitan, but it all leads to a refreshing cuppa.

In Australia, the oldest tea plants of the Camellia sinensis species date back to the 19th century, a time when we were the highest per capita consumer of tea in the world. Back then, our supply of ready-to-brew leaves came from China and the British colonial plantations in India, as well as Dutch-controlled Indonesia.

With such a strong thirst for tea in the nation, it was no wonder that an enterprising quartet of brothers decided to grow tea as a commercial crop. In the mid-1880s, James, Herbert, Leonard and Sidney Cutten found the climate of Bingil Bay in North Queensland most suitable for tea-growing and decided to develop a plantation. An unfortunate cluster of natural disasters – cyclones, then a tidal wave – wiped out their promising start, however, and the four were forced to abandon the project.

Fast forward several decades and the ‘lost’ plantation had become the stuff of legend. A legend that intrigued one Dr Allan Maruff, an Indian-born botany hobbyist who found the terroir of Innisfail, Queensland, to be very close to that of the tea-growing regions in his native country.

It was the 1950s, and Maruff had a thirst for adventure. He set off to Bingil Bay in search of the abandoned plantation and in the rainforest there he discovered the semi-wild plants from the Cutten brothers’ efforts growing tall and strong. The Cuttens had been right: it was the ideal climate. With seeds and seedlings from those plants, Maruff started a tea nursery with a view to start a tea plantation on a plot of land he’d purchased in the Nerada Valley, at the foothills of the Atherton Tablelands.

Unfortunately Maruff, a medical doctor by vocation, was not cut out for the tea industry and he ended up selling to a conglomerate known as the Tea Estates of Australia, the precursor to the brand we now know as Nerada Tea, a 1995 renaissance led by Tristan Russell of the Russell family, whose father John had started Malaysia’s BOH Tea plantations in 1927.

Today, Nerada produces about 85% of the Australian-grown tea on the market. Pesticide-free and Rainforest Alliance-certified, the tea is some of the freshest on offer for Australians with the journey ‘from crop to cup’ taking as little as 28 days. The rich volcanic soil and the perfect microclimate of the Atherton Tablelands contribute to the unique taste of Nerada’s award-winning tea, recently awarded five stars by consumers for the third consecutive year.

“Growing tea in Australia is no mean feat, but the quality is exceptional,” says Nerada Tea’s Plantation Director Tony Poyner. “We’d love tea drinkers to support our industry by pouring and enjoying a cup of Australian tea. Choose the Aussie brew.”

This article originally appeared in AUSTCS enews 12 September 2022. Mailchimp no longer allows external links to the original newsletter.