Basic Knowledge of Tea Art

Training Contents Regulated by National Occupational Standards - Tea Specialist

Professional ethics:

1. Professional ethics

2. Rules of professional conduct
* Devotion to duty.
* Obey laws and regulations.
* Be polite to guests.
* Be honest and sincere.
* Continue related study.

Basic knowledge

1. About tea culture

* Tea origins in China.
* The evolution of tea.
* The essence of tea culture.
* Customs of tea drinking home and abroad.

2. About leaves O About tea trees.

* Tea breeds.
* Famous tea breeds and production places.
* Knowledge about quality judgment.
* Tea-preservation methods.

3. About tea sets

* Different tea sets and their production places.
* Porcelain tea sets.
* Purple-clay tea sets.
* Chinese tea sets.
* Japanese tea sets.
* Other tea sets.

4. About water

* The relationship between tea making and water.
* Classification of water.
* Choosing tea-making water.

5. About tea art

* Key points of tasting.
* Skills of infusion.
* The choice of tea.

6. Scientific knowledge

* Main ingredients in tea.
* Common knowledge about healthy tea drinking.

7. About food and tea sanitation

* Basic knowledge about food and tea sanitation.
* Sanitizing the catering industry.

8. About relative laws and regulations
* Labor Law.
* Food Hygiene Law
* Law of the PRC on Protection of Consumer Rights and Interests.
* Public Administration Regulations.

Where to Learn Tea Art

Tea Art Training Institutions

Nowadays, many people want to learn tea art, though many of them don’t know the right places. To appreciate real tea culture, and learn formal tea art knowledge and standards, one should approach formal tea art training institutions.

Where to find a formal training institution? Take suggestions from experienced friends. And you can get information from all kinds of media and advertisement. However, here is some advice: To decide one from a number of training institutions, make phone calls to clarify doubts and ambiguous matters, such as class type, training fee, number of courses, training environment, teachers, certificates, etc. Make sure if they are formal. Then, do an on-the-spot investigation.

There is a shortage of high-quality tea specialists with advanced skills

A tea specialist shows tea house culture, and is the core power in a tea house. Good professional tea specialists usually can earn credits from customers and bring direct profits. Major tea companies, tea houses and tea shops regard tea specialists as an important role in the further development of enterprises. Therefore, the career prospect is good.

As tea art is gradually entering our life, tea specialist jobs are becoming popular. Tea art has become a professional industry. There are over 50,000 tea houses across the country, and the number is increasing by 20% in northern cities, such as Beijing, Tianjin, Jinan and Shenyang. The demand for tea specialists is growing.

Requirements for a Professional Tea Specialist

Basic education Junior Secondary School Graduate or above.

Added qualification
Good understanding of culture and sharp vision for arts.

Knowledge
Knowledge of famous tea breeds, famous springs and tea culture, which includes tea preservation methods, judging tea's quality, etc.

Skills
Ability to instruct tea tasting and Asian tea sets properly. Ability to choose the right quality, amount and temperature of water and choose appropriate tea ware, and be able to demonstrate and introduce all kinds of professional tea-making processes.

Others (additional requirements)
Ability to recommend proper tea pastry for customers; be able to choose or arrange relevant music, costumes, flowers, incense etc., to create fitting atmosphere.

Major abilities of tea specialist
Good language skill, fairly good interpersonal communication and perception ability, sharp sense of smell, sight and taste. Tea specialist is a comprehensive profession, which popularizes tea culture and provides tea service as well as relevant art performance.

The Tea Specialist

In recent years, more and more people in large cities are learning tea art, not as a career prospect, but as a hobby or spiritual therapy. Most of them are women, some are professionals, some are school students and some are foreigners with great interest in the long history of China's tea art.

For those who learn tea art to improve their career, there are chances that they will be employed in the tea industry as tea specialists or tea house managers.

Who is a tea specialist?

In China, running a tea house is an old business, while tea specialist is a modern profession. In 1999, tea specialist was formally included in The Occupational Classification of People's Republic of China, which defines tea specialist as: A tea specialist is a personnel who works in a tea house, tea restaurant, etc. and performs tea art according to the quality of tea leaves.