Executive Dean of China Institute for Enterprise Innovation   Qiu Yanglin

China's comprehensive production value of tea industry has reached RMB 500 billion, which is the data provided by Lu Yao, director of CASS Tea Industry Development Research Center in the “Century World Expo Famous Tea Development Seminar”.
 
According to this data, we should feel that the consumption preference of Chinese people on teas has formed a certain mass base. In fact, the residents from more than 100 countries and regions in the world like tasting teas.
 
It is well-known that tea culture is the Chinese unique long-standing culture and Chinese tea culture is extensive and profound; the production value of tea industry always occupies a certain market share in the Chinese economy. The explanation on the production value of RMB 500 billion is as follows: RMB 100 billion for agricultural industry, RMB 200 billion for wholesale and retail industry, RMB 70 billion for teahouse industry, RMB 70 billion for tea beverage industry, RMB 20 billion for tea food industry, RMB 10 billion for tea fine processing product industry, RMB 20 billion for tea mechanical product industry and RMB 10 billion for other industries.
 
Tea trees are evergreen shrubs or small tree plants with the height of 1-6 meters and like the humid climate, which are widely cultivated in the region in the south of the Yangtze River Basin of China. After tea trees have grown for 3 years, tea leaves can be picked for making finished products. Teas are the health beverages widespread around the world and originate from China, and Chinese people have had more than four thousand years of tea-drinking history.  
 
The Classic of Tea is the first earliest, most complete and comprehensive tea introduction monograph existing in China and even the world, which is honored as the “Tea Encyclopedia” written by Lu Yu, Chinese tea art founder. This monograph basically divides teas into green tea, black tea, oolong tea, white tea, yellow tea and dark tea. Chinese famous teas mainly include Wuyi Rock Tea, West Lake Longjing Tea, Dongting Pilochum Tea, Junshan Silver Needle Tea, Huangshan Maofeng Tea, Lushan Cloud-fog Tea, Anxi Tieguanyin Tea, LiuAn Guapian Tea, Xinyang Maojian Tea and Keemun Black Tea.
 
Teas contain nearly 500 ingredients which mainly include caffeine, theophylline, theobromine, choline, xanthine, flavonoid and glycoside compound, tea tannin, catechin, terpene, phenol, alcohol, aldehyde, acid, ester, aromatic oil compound, carbohydrate, multivitamin, protein, amino acid, calcium, phosphorus, iron, fluorine, iodine, manganese, molybdenum, zinc, selenium, copper, germanium, magnesium and other minerals.
 
The main ingredients of teas include tea polyphenol, caffeine, lipopolysaccharide, etc, which has specific functions, such as virusin inhibition and resistance, diuresis and fatigue recovery, cardiovascular disease inhibition, cancer prevention and resistance, radiation injury prevention and treatment, fat-lowering and digestion-aiding, delaying senescence, tooth protection and eyesight improvement, refreshing, skin beautification and protection, etc. Teas have a lot of efficacies to prevent and treat many diseases including internal medicine, surgery, gynecology and pediatrics. Teas are medicines, which is recorded in the Book of Medicines. Therefore, teas are not only the medicines but also the “medicines of all diseases” emphasized by Chen Cangqi in the Tang Dynasty.     
 
With the scientific and technological progress, the tea industry is being in a polarization state and has developed from original teas to reprocessing teas. The teas reprocessed through taking various raw teas or refined teas as raw materials and combining with modern technology tools are named as reprocessing teas, including scented tea, compressed tea, extracting tea, fruit flavored tea, medical health tea, tea beverage, etc. as well as frequently-seen diet tea, ice black tea, ice green tea, milk tea, etc.
 
The electric appliance can be used to achieve the drying effect, and various functional teas of reducing blood press and weight and refreshing can be developed through the combination with the mechanical processing, physical processing, chemical and biochemical processing, comprehensive technology and other deep processing technologies. Certainly, the realization of tea-making technology is only one aspect; what the tea industry needs is mainly to rely on the rear-end tea product market development and the culture connotation and brand tension attached to teas.