The chamber where tea clones are being grown under increased levels of temperature and carbon dioxide. Telegraph picture

Jorhat, July 14: Imagine Assam without a tea industry. Unimaginable? Well, that’s exactly what may happen 20 years later when, going by current indicators, high carbon dioxide levels and resultant high temperatures could shrivel the tea bushes out of existence.

The consequent impact on the state’s economy would surely not leave much to the imagination.

Hope, however, springs eternal. As the entire world gears up to face the challenges of climate change and its impact on food production, the Tocklai Experimental Station here is conducting experiments to prevent deterioration of tea quality as a result of global warming and, in turn, to help the tea industry survive the future.

Tocklai Experimental Station director N. Muraleedharan said tea clones were being grown in a chamber with a simulated high temperature-high carbon dioxide climate to ascertain which clone would survive and thrive under such conditions.

“Call it the tea of the future but we are at present working to find out which clones will retain the best tea quality under such conditions. Climate change, increased carbon dioxide levels and the greenhouse effect are part of a reality that cannot be ignored and is one of the greatest challenges the industry is facing today,” he said.

Deputy director Rajiv Bhagat, who is in charge of the project, said all the 31 clones released by the station to the tea industry were being studied in two open-top chambers.

“We are studying the behaviour of various clones in an altered climate — how the plants will respond to more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, how they will respond to differences in humidity, the changes in leaf physiology, anatomy of the plant and its root system at high temperatures,” he said.

In one of the open-top chambers, the clones are being kept in natural conditions and in the other, the climate is altered in accordance with a predicted scale, known as climate modelling, which is being used worldwide to experiment on other plants.

The station is hopeful of publishing the results within two years. One season of experiments has already been completed.

“Though we have completed one season, it is not enough to predict which clone will yield more. Two more seasons will be required before we can say anything for sure,” Bhagat said.

Guwahati Tea Auction Buyers’ Association secretary Dinesh Bihani was recently quoted in a report as saying that Assam tea had lost its punch and that buyers were complaining that the liquor was not of the quality attributed to Assam tea.

Paramount Tea Marketing (P) Limited vice-president Kamal Chandra Das, too, had said the second flush this year had lost the usual characteristics of Assam tea, mainly its liquor attributes, because of temperature changes.