Pruned and shaped by man over 50 or so years, the tea plants become real dwarf-trees to form plantations. These are a mixture of massive green covers and miniature forests.

The tea plant belongs to the Camelia family. There are two main varieties of the camelia sinensis or thea sinensis:
1. Chinese type, known as sinensis, with small and olive green leaves;
2. Assam variety, known as assamica, which has large, pale, plump leaves.
3. Hybrid Jats /clonals: Other varieties have now appeared as a result of hybridization, grafting, propagation from cuttings etc.

The cultivated tea plant is a bush with evergreen leaves, the upper surfaces of which are shiny and the undersides matt and paler. The young leaves and buds are covered with a light, silvery down, hence their name known as "Pekoe" after the Chinese word Pak-ho meaning "fine hair" or "down".

The main growing countries are :

▪ Asia: China, India, Japan, Taiwan, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Malaysia, Vietnam, Bangladesh
▪ Africa: Cameroon, Mauritius, Kenya, Rwanda, Zimbabwe
▪ South America: Argentina, Brazil
▪ Around the Caspian and Black Seas: Georgia, Iran and Turkey

▪ Top average temperature: 18°C - 20°C with little daily variations. The climate has an affect both in the volume and the quality of the harvest.

▪ Effect on Quality: Humidity gives a lower quality. A dry season often brings higher quality harvests. High altitude also improves quality with a smaller yield. In tropical regions, the tea plant can be cultivated at altitudes ranging from sea level up to 2,500m.

▪ Importance of Sunlight: It is necessary for the formation of the essential oils that give the brew its aroma. The light should preferably be scattered: this is why large trees are regularly planted on tea plantations, they regulate the soil ecology and filter the strong sunrays.

▪ Quality of Soil: Preferably permeable, loose and deep since the tea plant's roots can push down to a depth of up to 6m. Soil cover should be at least 1.5m deep. The best areas have a young, volcanic soil which is very permeable and rich in humus, neither basal nor too clayey. Tea is always grown on sloping ground, allowing for natural drainage, since the tea plants, cannot survive in stagnant water. The tea plant is very resilient, it can be grown on extreme gradients and is perfectly suited to the most steeply-sloping, mountainous terrain.

▪ Growing tea used to be done from seeds that were re-planted. Nowadays reproduction of tea plants is basically accomplished by taking cuttings from selected plants.

▪ The cuttings are taken from the chosen plants and then replanted onto nursery beds where they remain for 12 to 18 months. When they turn into young plants, they are replanted in the main plantation, spaced out in a way that the fully grown bushes cover the entire area upon maturity.

▪ The plant is left for 4 years before any leaves can be plucked.

▪ Constant pruning and shaping will form its required height of 1.20m, to create the plucking table and give a good framework to the bush.

▪ Full growth reaches until the 5th year when it will begin to produce. Pruning occurs at varying intervals - on average every two years - in order to keep it at a good height for plucking.
▪ A mature tea plant usually lives for 40 - 50 years. Some varieties can live up to 100 years.

▪ At the end of the 5th year, the tea plant is ready to be harvested. This operation, which consists of a light, repeated, pruning of the young shoots, is carried out in a 7 to 15 days cycle, depending on the growth, the climate and the amount of tea to be plucked.

There are three types of plucking:

▪ Imperial plucking: the bud and the leaf that directly follows

▪ Fine plucking: the bud and the two leaves that follow. This is a harvest of excellent quality

▪ Average plucking: the bud and the three leaves that follow. This gives a lesser quality tea than the previous two but it allows the tea plant to grow better
The leaves are never plucked separately: the part of the stem that unites the young shoot and the leaves is always plucked as a whole. In order to obtain some much sought-after teas, the 4th and 5th leaves, also called Souchong, are picked. These are usually to be found in smoked Chinese teas. After a certain period of time the tea plant will have stems with no young shoots. This marks the resting period. The end bud is formed of the "deaf" leaf which is then removed in order to allow the stems to recover.

Plucking is still done, in the majority of cases, by hand.
Mechanization of tea plucking is still very rare; with some exceptions however:

▪ In Japan: scissors are used
▪ Also in Japan, and in Georgia: mechanized clippers are used to straddle the rows and pluck an area with a width of 1.5m. This method presupposes a flat terrain and a large harvest, except in Japan where mechanization is very advanced but also very expensive
▪ In Argentina: tractors are used