Like most people, we like having people round for tea. Especially when they’re as nice as Yorkshire cricketer Joe Sayers, who popped in yesterday to meet our expert tea buyers.

Over the years, we’ve had a wide variety of visitors here in Harrogate, from Prince Charles to Rwandan tea farmers. And each visit is special in its own way – in this case, opening batsman Joe came in to talk to us about our Runs For The Rainforest idea.

Basically, for every run scored by Yorkshire in the 2010 season, we promise to protect a tree in the Peruvian Amazon – all as part of the Yorkshire Rainforest Project, our pledge to save an area of rainforest the size of Yorkshire.

Joe, who scored over 1,000 runs in last year’s season, has really got behind the idea. “Every player always wants to score plenty of runs,” he said. “But now there’s an extra incentive.”

As well as talking to us about the project, Joe also got the chance to meet our Head of Tea, Ian, who showed him round our tea tasting room, where Ian and his team taste literally hundreds of teas every day. Both Joe and Ian have spent a fair bit of time in India (for different reasons obviously) so they had plenty to talk about. Not only that but Joe got a whistlestop tour of the world of tea, and even joined in with some tasting – quite an odd sight to see a professional cricketer in his whites slurping and spitting tea!

It wasn’t all hard work though. He got his very own box of ‘Sayer’s Tea’ and we made sure he got a chance to sit down and have a proper cup of tea before setting off – but no spitting this time.

It’s been quite a fortnight for our Sam – travelling round the Peruvian Amazon, meeting the people we’re working with for our Yorkshire Rainforest Project. After last week’s message from Lima, we’re pleased to say she’s back. Here she tells us more about her experience:

“I’m back in England now and still digesting everything I learned, saw and experienced on my visit to the Ashaninka communities and the Ashaninka Congress. The Congress, which was held for two days in the beautiful and peaceful village of Pamikiari, brought to life the problems that communities are contending with: petrol companies working their way in to extract oil; an explosion of logging in the area; threats from Coca growers; even the possibility of a hydro-electric dam, which will flood communities in the Ene valley.

Because of this, it’s hugely important that the Ashaninka have faith in those who are working with them to protect their homes and lands. We’re working with a team on the ground called Central Ashaninka del Rio Ene, or CARE (pronounced kah-ray). Many of their members are Ashaninka themselves, so they’re determined to prevent the exploitation of the communities and their forest lands. For Rosa from CARE, the goal is for people to continue living as Ashaninka and for the forests to keep their natural beauty. She told us: “In the forests, you breathe clean air, and it is this that is not only vital for those who live there, but for everyone else.”

Of course, oil and timber are money-making resources so it is important that communities are given a viable alternative to the short-term profit that would be made from allowing an area of land to be exploited. This is where the sustainable livelihoods come in. Together with Cristina, our Ethical Trading Manager, I had the opportunity to see an example of this in Pamikiari – a cocoa plantation that has gone from being neglected and underused to being cared for and properly managed. With training in the cultivation of the crops and how to sell them, these plantations can now provide an income for the families who own them. And the trees will still be there for the next generation.”

Earlier this month, we told you about our Sam’s trip to the Peruvian Amazon. To help with our Yorkshire Rainforest Project, she was off to meet with the people on the ground who we’re working with, and to stay with the Ashaninka – the communities who live in the rainforest. After so long with no contact (she was in the rainforest after all) we’re rather relieved to hear she’s alive and well and back in Lima. Here’s what she had to say:

“Wow, what an amazing trip! From being thrown into a bustling, congested, polluted Lima to sleeping through a drive over the Andes, then waking up to a vast, cloud covered, lush green rainforest.

Sailing down the Rio Ene and through the Amazon is nothing short of spectacular – you see life in abundance and it was clear on arrival at the first community, Puerto Ashaninka, that this is not taken for granted. We were offered (literally) the fruits of the forest, from coconuts to oranges to yucca (an Ashaninka diet staple), fish and samani, a small boar.

And of course the first bowl of the infamous ‘spit beer’, masato, was passed around. I have to say it tastes a little better than I imagined it would – but it comes in all sorts of strengths so it’s wise to take caution. This community, as with each one we visited, was generous, kind and keen to make the most of their natural surroundings – incredible to see when back in England we are so far removed from the source of our food, housing, water etc. And yet it became clear from early on that the threats to their very way of being (one Ashaninka child, Nike, told me that to be Ashaninka means to be a person of the forest) are very real and getting more serious. It was enlightening, though, the work that the Ashaninka are putting in to combat these threats and look after their home.

CARE, the team on the ground who we’re working with, have done a lot of work in a short space of time on the project. It’s great to be able to see some results – especially from the sustainable livelihoods programme.

Look out for lots more info on this and many other things when I get back to Harrogate next week!

What kinds of things do you pack for a fortnight in the rainforest?

These are the sorts of questions our Sam’s been asking herself (and us, to be honest) for the last few days. And with good reason – she’s off to Peru, where she’ll meet the people we’re working with for our Yorkshire Rainforest Project.

Sam shows us where she’s heading

She flies today, but we managed to catch her for just long enough to ask how she’s feeling:

“I’m nearly all packed and ready to head out to the Amazon. We’re one year into the first stage of our commitment to save an area of rainforest the size of Yorkshire and since we started work on this, I have already learned so much about how vital the rainforest is, not only as the Earth’s life support system but also to the people who live there, relying on the rainforest for their fuel, food, shelter and livelihoods. To be able to see this first-hand and to meet some of the people who call the rainforest home will be an amazing opportunity.

I’ll also be meeting people from the Ashaninka community, who we’re working with the Rainforest Foundation to support. They’ve lived in the Amazon for generations but the forests in their region are increasingly threatened by logging, the possibility of a hydroelectric dam and drilling for oil. I hope to see how our project is helping the Ashaninka to both protect their home and use their resources effectively and sustainably. And, of course, I’ll also be able to see the wonders of the rainforest up close. With my trusty camera and video recorder I’ll be carefully documenting my trip – from the people I meet, to the flora and fauna, to the creepy crawlies that may well form part of my diet while I’m there…

It’s sure to be an incredible trip and I can’t wait to tell you all about it when I return.”

Look out for Sam’s report when she returns later this month.

Readers of Craft’s Beautiful and Let’s Make Cards magazines have been putting their craft skills to very good use to support our Yorkshire Rainforest Project! Crafters across the country were called on to help us raise funds for the project by designing and decorating their own ‘eco-bags’.

We have had some stunning entries, with bags sporting brightly coloured parrots, sparkling butterflies and fabulous floral motifs.

All of these bags will support our mission to help save an area of rainforest the size of Yorkshire. For the first stage of our campaign we are working with the Rainforest Foundation UK, in the Ashaninka Communal Reserve of Peru’s Amazon rainforest to provide the Ashaninka community with essential training to resist those looking to exploit the forest’s rich resources, and to help families make a living by developing small-scale sustainable livelihood programmes.

Picking a winning bag is going to be a challenge, but a huge thank you to everyone who has sent in a bag and to Craft’s Beautiful and Let’s Make Cards for their support.

Hilary Benn MP and CO2 Sense Yorkshire Chairman Barry Dodd join our Jamie, Aizlynn and Chris on stage with TV presenter Julia Bradbury

It was a great night for our family business at the Yorkshire Post Environment Awards earlier this month. Thanks to the commitment of everyone here we collected the award for Best Environmental Business.

The awards are held to ‘celebrate excellence and innovation in the environmental field’ and applicants for the award had to demonstrate a world-class track record on environmental and carbon-reduction policies, as well as a clear commitment to reducing their environmental impact.

As well as being described by the judges as an ‘exemplar’, we also had a message of support from Downing Street. Prime Minister Gordon Brown offered congratulations to all the winners and runners up, saying: “the excellent work being done by the companies and individuals across Yorkshire, as reflected in these awards, will not only help Yorkshire’s environment, but offer the prospect of real future prosperity and quality of life in the region.”

Our Health, Safety and Environment Manager Jamie had this to say: “From helping to save the rainforest, to reducing packaging and recycling waste, and from the Cone Exchange to using rainwater for our toilets – this award really reflects the wonderful efforts of teams from across the business.”

Here’s something we’ve not mentioned before on the blog: our recycling pirate, Captain Rummage.

Captain Rummage at Buckingham Palace

No, we’re not making it up. Here at Taylors we really do have a recycling pirate. And he really is called Captain Rummage. (Although his friends know him as Chris to be fair.)

In fact, he’s now our ‘award-winning’ recycling pirate. Thanks to him, Taylors scooped gold at the prestigious Food and Drink Federation Community Partnership Awards in the Environment Category.

Oh yes, and he also received an MBE last year. He had to go down to Buckingham Palace so that Prince Charles could present him with.

But at the heart of it all is our community recycling project, the Cone Exchange, where Chris works with various different social groups in our local area to ‘turn trash into treasure’.

It started over a decade ago, when Chris was giving a group of adults with special needs a tour of our factory. One visitor spotted a pile of cardboard cones in our waste bins – leftovers from the big rolls of string we use for tagged teabags. They asked to take some away to make ‘Christmas angels’ out of.

The cones that started it all…

This started a trend and before you knew it, loads of people were making decorations out of our old cones, then selling them with the help of neighbourhood shops.

The whole thing was a big hit – it cut down on our rubbish, raised money for charity and brought the whole community a bit closer together. Unsurprisingly, Chris was hooked.

He started finding more and more ways to recycle things we once threw away – from reusing waste that as craft materials to collecting old phones and ink cartridges for charities like Oxfam – making contact with more and more local people and groups who wanted to be involved along the way.

Soon he needed a base to store all the stuff he was collecting and trading, and the Cone Exchange was born – our tribute to the Corn Exchanges of olden times.

Chris also began visiting local schools to encourage them to help and he took to dressing up as the pirate Captain Rummage to capture their imagination… or possibly just so he could wear fancy dress.

But why a pirate?

Well, it could be about the hunt for treasure amongst the trash. Or maybe it’s to do with his ‘reduce, reuse and recycle’ mantra – otherwise known as the three ‘arrrs’!

Tea sacks don’t get good press. To be fair, they don’t get any press. These functional, rather plain, bags are always overshadowed by the glorious tea they carry.

But beneath that dull exterior, they’re actually rather clever. A special foil lining ensures the tea leaves stay as fresh as possible as they make their way to our factory. In fact, we get through more than six tonnes of them each month.

Here’s Vanessa with a stack of sacks

The problem is, because the foil is bonded to the paper it makes them really tricky to recycle. Only certain companies have the technology to process them.

Previously, to avoid sending the old sacks to landfill, we’ve been shipping them to a company in the Netherlands, but doing that obviously increases our carbon emissions – so we were desperate to find someone closer to home.

Thankfully, we have – through the lovely people at Clear Waste Services we found a company in Stockport who now take our old tea sacks… and turn it into graph paper!

So next time you’re enjoying a cuppa, take a moment to think about that unsung hero, the humble tea sack. Not so pretty, but rather well travelled and now doubly useful.

Hello, and welcome to the first ever Yorkshire Tea blog.

From here on in we promise to bring you regular updates from the world of Yorkshire Tea. Whether it’s the adventures of our expert tea-buyers as they travel the world visiting our growers or simply interesting things we’ve discovered closer to home, we aim to share and hope you enjoy.

To start with, however, let’s talk about something that has NOTHING TO DO WITH TEA.

The rainforest.

Actually, it’s got plenty to do with tea. Plenty to do with everything in fact. The rainforest, which absorbs carbon and emits oxygen on a massive scale, is our planet’s life support system.

And it’s being destroyed.

An acre of rainforest is lost every second. Half of it has already gone, forever. We now know that this deforestation is a major cause of climate change. The destruction of the rainforest generates more greenhouse gas emissions each year than all the trains, planes and cars on the planet.

That’s why we’ve started the Yorkshire Rainforest Project– our plan to save an area of rainforest the size of Yorkshire. Together with the Rainforest Foundation UK, we’re working with the Ashaninka people of the Peruvian Amazon to protect the forest they call home from the many threats they face: loggers, petrochemical companies, illegal settlers… the list is long and the challenge is great.

The good news is, if you’re a Yorkshire Tea drinker, you’re already helping. For every box of tea we sell, we’re saving a rainforest tree. But if you’d like to do more than that, you can – collect the tokens on our packs and for every four you save, another 50p goes into our Yorkshire Rainforest Project fund.

This is obviously a big mission and we’re in it for the long run. We’ll keep you posted as things develop.

So that’s it for now – thanks for reading our first blog. We’d love to know what you think, so please get in touch if you’ve got something to say.

Till next time!