Deniyaya - Kaley Teas

Kaley Teas was the first partner property brought under the PLANT umbrella, in May 2021. The 23 Acre Kaley Tea Estate (www.kaleytea.com) has a very rich tropical biodiversity partly due to its mosaic of lowland tropical rainforests and crop fields, and partly due to its exclusive use of organic fertilizer. Situated in the heart of the biodiversity-rich wet zone of Sri Lanka, just 12 km from the Sinharaja; the UNESCO world natural heritage site, and surrounded by pristine rainforests, Kaley estate still bears significant biodiversity specifically in terms of plants. The forest patches act as vital refuges for some of the endemic forest specialists therefore supporting high endemicity, and our baseline survey established it at over 25%, across almost 250 different species. Over 100 bird species light up the sky and tree lines at Kaley.

Kaley Tea is an organic, hand-picked, single source tea product grown and made in Deniyaya. At the estate, tea seeds from 100-year-old tea trees in the wild are used to grow tea organically and regeneratively alongside multiple crops in a forest setting. The estate produces multiple crops alongside tea in a plantation-forest mosaic, sustaining productivity and rainforest biodiversity within the estate. There are aspirations to make the location a mini conservation research hub along with a pilot for leveraging economic value in a harmonious manner with the forest eco systems.