Owner of Taiwan's former Japanese tea factories, including the Daxi and Sun Moon Lake (Yuchi) works; listed since 1962 and now partly a tea-tourism business.
The company says it was founded in 1899, counting its Mitsui predecessor. Ku's economic history dates the state tea company to January 1947 and its incorporation into Taiwan Agriculture and Forestry to May 1947. The listed company's register date is 1950-06-15. We give 1947 as the start of this company.
In the Japanese era Mitsui ran large mechanised factories in northern Taiwan making Nitto (日東) black tea; the Jiaobanshan works (now the Daxi Old Tea Factory) was built in 1926 and produced up to 600 long tons a year. After the war the eight Japanese tea companies were taken over and merged into the Taiwan Provincial Tea Company in January 1947; in May 1947 it became the tea branch of the new Taiwan Agriculture and Forestry Co. (台灣農林). Its shares were among those of four state firms used in 1953 to compensate landlords under the land-to-the-tiller reform, and its output counted as private from January 1955.
The present company's register date is 1950-06-15, and it has been listed on the Taiwan Stock Exchange (code 2913) since 1962-02-09. Its Yuchi factory at Sun Moon Lake dates from 1956 (building 1959), stopped pesticide use in 2003 and turned into the Riyue Old Tea Factory tourism site in 2008, selling Assam-type black tea (Tai Cha No. 8). Today the company combines tea, leisure sites and land development.
