Reshama Karmakar, 23, a member of the Proagoti Adolescent Girls Group on Dikom Tea Estate, Dibrugarh, Assam, India.

UNICEF Improving Lives – Phase III

The third phase of our collaboration with UNICEF supporting communities in 205 Assam tea estates.

A ground-breaking partnership reaching tens of thousands of children and women.

We have been working with UNICEF since 2014 to improve life for communities living and working on tea estates in Assam, India.

These communities face many hardships, including a lack of healthcare, poor nutrition, little access to essential services, under-investment in education, and a need for enhanced child protection.

The Improving Lives programme aims to better the underlying systems impacting daily life for children and their families across roughly one quarter of Assam’s tea estates.

2022-2025
Status: On-track

Policy

Project

Economics

Equality

Decent livelihoods

Empowered safe communities

Equal opportunities

India

Project overview

The third phase of this programme aims to integrate Family Friendly Policies into the workplace, improve gender equality, and introduce disaster-resilient infrastructure.

Project partners

UNICEF, ETP core funding, JDE, Ostfriesische Tee Gesellschaft GmbH & Co. KG, Taylors of Harrogate, The Starbucks Foundation, and Tata Consumer Products Ltd.

Supriya, 14, at her family home in Deohall Tea Estate, Tinsukia District, Assam, India. She is an active member of the community youth group, with an avid interest in safe water and good hygiene. Image: Biju Boro/UNICEF

Helping children attend pre-school and improving education quality so they can complete primary school and attend secondary school.
Supporting adolescents to protect themselves from violence, exploitation, abuse and make communities safer.
Supporting all women, newborns, children and adolescents in the selected tea gardens to have access to quality healthcare and nutrition.
Striving for all households, workplaces and facilities in tea gardens to have access and use improved water and sanitation facilities.

Encouraging engagement from tea industry to deliver solutions to human and child rights challenges.

For full details of the programme’s aims, visit UNICEF’s ETP partnership page.

Building on Phases I and II, Phase III of the programme has shifted its approach to supporting dialogue between local actors.

It will:

Assist government ministries to roll out services on tea estates.
Work with tea estate managers and two major tea associations to integrate Family Friendly Policies into the workplace.
Collaborate with community platforms and leaders to build inclusive and sustainable governance.

Improving Lives is an example of the power of partnerships at scale – helping deliver systemic change to root causes of some of the most complex issues people in tea face.

School pupils on the Hokonguri Tea Estate, Dum Duma, Tinsukia, Assam.

Key achievements of the partnership so far include:

76% of households now have improved sanitation and drinking water.
Linked more than 120,000 pregnant women and children under five to healthcare services.
Influenced the Assam Government to make essential medication and healthcare equipment free to 651 tea estate hospitals.
All 205 estates now have recognised Child Protection Committees (CPCs).
Reached more than 1,200 adolescent club members with menstrual hygiene management promotion.

362 community adolescent girl groups (27,958 girls) and 167 boy groups (6,301 boys) formed.

Key achievements

205

tea estates, one quarter of Assam’s gardens

300,000

community members reached

137,000

children and young people reached

120,000

pregnant women and children under five linked to healthcare services

76%

of households now have improved sanitation and drinking water