Growth industry: Collective bidding to grow tea in Courier Country.

A massive cash input is being used to brew up interest in Courier Country teas – and to keep that interest well and truly on the boil.

A plantation at St Martin’s Abbey, Balbeggie, near Scone, was the setting for the launch of the Artisan Tea Gardens Ltd initiative, which will benefit from £49,500-worth of cash.

In a Scottish first, a nine-strong collaboration of tea farmers in Angus, Fife and Perthshire will use the money to help them meet the challenge of farming the crop in the local climate.

The Leader rural development funding will help the project tap into specialist advice from tea consultants and buy equipment for working in individual gardens.

Within the next few years the group also aims to develop a tea trail around the sites, allowing fans to see the gardens and compare the teas.

The collaboration consists of two Angus growers, five in Perth and Kinross and two in Fife.

Angus Leader coordinator Dave Tollick said: “The potential is for the gardens involved to provide groundbreaking new tea products and, eventually, to develop training courses for growers and hopefully, a tea trail around the gardens for tea fans.”

Some producers have already bagged spots at the tea tables of top Scottish hotels, with their brews sometimes commanding around £10 a pot.

Among the intriguingly-named varieties are Ecclefechan Oolong, Isle of Mull Matcha and Garrocher Garden Berry Black.

To qualify as tea, the blend needs to contain leaves from the camellia sinensis plant, which is more at home in the humid climes of India, China and Taiwan. However, Scottish growers have found that mature plants also can thrive in a relatively cool climate such as the one here.

The LAG Leader 2014-2020 programme is part-funded by the Scottish Government and the European Community and aims to improve the quality of life in rural areas.

Leader Local Action Groups (LAGs) are made up of representatives with an interest in rural development.

Picture: Mhairi Edwards. Members of the Artisan Tea Gardens Ltd initiative, who want to boil up interest in locally-grown tea varieties.