Page 3 - Rwagashani Tea Plantation

Tea picking

Paid work has given women a voice. It has raised their status in the community. Many women in
Rwagashani are now able to buy clothes for themselves and for other family members, take care
of basic household needs and improve family nutrition, among other things. Most important of all,
women contribute towards the cost of their children’s education. For example, unlike in the past,
almost all children of school-age are now in school.

Rwagashani Tea Plantation busily engages 36 casual workers (70% of these are women) in
plucking and selling tea leaves from the 18 acres of a mature tea plantation. Each picker is paid
per kilogram picked at an established rate of 160 Uganda shillings.

The more kilograms one picks the more money one earns. At this farm, experienced pickers pick
between 83 and 52 kilograms of fresh leaf per day, earning 13,280 and 8,320 respectively
compared to 9,600 shillings per day paid by government to U8 (the lowest government scale)
salary scale earners. The farm sells around 6,000 kilograms of plucked fresh leaves monthly.
Plucking is done during the mid week and during the last week of each month. After the plucking,
tea factories collect the plucked tea on Tuesdays and Thursdays of the tea plucking weeks. The
earnings are spent on paying workers; buying farm equipment, fertilizer and herbicides mainly to
kill weeds.

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