Tea Board launches certified tasting and sommelier courses in Kurseong
The Tea Board of India has begun 60-hour tea tasting and 210-hour sommelier courses at its Kurseong research centre, aiming to build talent for quality assurance, branding and value addition across India’s tea industry.
What happened
Tea Board of India launched certified tea tasting and sommelier courses at its Kurseong research centre to build skilled talent, improve quality assurance,
Key facts
- 60-hour certificate course
- 210-hour course
- National Education Policy-2020
Why this matters
Tea companies, hospitality groups and education providers have partnership opportunities with the Tea Board to build certified training, experiential retail and premium tea propositions.
What to watch
- Enrollment mix between estate employees, independent brands, hospitality operators and retail professionals.
- Placement outcomes, employer recognition and the number of graduates working in consumer-facing roles.
- New Tea Board-backed quality marks, origin certifications or export promotion tied to trained tasters.
- Growth in specialty, single-estate, organic and traceable Indian tea SKUs at premium retailers and online marketplaces.
- Hotel, café and airline adoption of tea-sommelier-led menus or tea pairing programs.
- Specialty tea brands partner with the Tea Board or course alumni for certification-backed product launches and tasting events.
- Premium grocers, hotels and cafés recruit tea sommeliers to build curated assortments, pairing menus and staff education programs.
- Estates invest in smaller-lot processing, traceability and origin-led packaging to convert improved grading capability into retail margin.
- E-commerce tea sellers use tasting credentials and flavor taxonomy to improve discovery, subscriptions and premium conversion.
Also reported by
- BL · Consumer & Economy — Same time