Alishan Drought Cut Tea Output About 30 to 40%, Official Says
A dry spring delayed Alishan's high-mountain tea harvest and cut output 30 to 40 percent, Taiwanese officials said as the region announced its 2026 tea-competition winners.
A spring drought delayed Taiwan's Alishan high-mountain tea harvest by up to ten days and cut output 30% to 40%, officials said as the region's growers association crowned this year's competition winners.
The Alishan Township Farmers' Association graded 418 entries in its 2026 Spring High-Altitude Premium Tea Competition, split between 347 lots of Qingxin Oolong and 71 of Jin Xuan. Results were announced May 27, and the association held an awards ceremony and public tea sale June 13 at the Alishan National Scenic Area Administration plaza.
Qiu Shifu, a grower with Gaodiyuan Tea Industry, took the Qingxin Oolong group's special award, the competition's top prize, with a lot that sold for NT$80,000 (about US$2,500) per catty (600 grams). Wang Hongcheng of Wangding Tea Garden won the Jin Xuan group's champion award, priced at NT$12,000 (about US$380) per catty. Judges scored entries on appearance, liquor color, aroma and taste.
Qiu Chuifeng, deputy director of Taiwan's Tea and Beverage Research Station and one of the competition's judges, said low rainfall before the Qingming festival in early April hit Jin Xuan harder than Qingxin Oolong. The dry spell pushed back the ideal picking window by about seven to ten days, he said. Rain returned around the Guyu solar term in late April, letting growers harvest within season and partly recover lost volume, he said, but the region's overall output still fell an average of 30% to 40%.
Chiayi County's government and the Agriculture and Food Agency's southern branch randomly sampled entries for pesticide residues, and DNA testing checked their origin; all sampled batches were confirmed pesticide-compliant, Taiwan-grown tea before the results were announced.
Chiayi County Magistrate Weng Zhang-liang said the Greater Alishan region's tea quality rests on its natural environment and on farmers' fieldwork and craft, and that tea quality stayed high despite the drought.
Sources: 自由時報 (Liberty Times), 阿里山春季高海拔優良茶競賽成績揭曉 6月13日頒獎展售 (zh-Hant); 蕃新聞 (yam News), 阿里山農會「2026阿里山春季高海拔優良茶競賽頒獎暨展售會」 (zh-Hant).
Correction, October 3, 2026: An earlier version said the farmers' association ran the pesticide sampling, which Chiayi County and the Agriculture and Food Agency's southern branch carried out, overstated the magistrate's remarks on tea quality, converted the Jin Xuan price as about US$370 rather than about US$380, called the two competition cultivars the only ones grown in the district, and said without a source that the district runs a second spring competition.