Tea is grown in Uganda in Mengo, Toro, Mityana, Masaka, Ankole, Kigezi and Bunyoro districts. Of these Mengo and Toro have the maximum area under tea.All these tea areas are situated on either side of the equator to the north and west of Lake Victoria.The average elevation of the tea areas is approximately 1300 m except in Toro where the elevation in almost 1800 m.The Assam jats (Dangri Manipuri, Betjan, Rajghur) are the main planting materials in Uganda. Tea bushes in Uganda do not pass through a dormant season and plucking continues throughout the year.
In Uganda, the political environment that prevailed between 1974 and 1988 hindered the expansion of tea areas and most of the commercial companies, except a few small companies and these few small companies are reinvesting in tea production. The Uganda Tea Growers Corporation (UTGC) which was established in1966 for promotion, cultivation and marketing of tea produced by smallholdings encouraged the small farmers of Uganda to cultivate in small scale and presently about 46 % of tea areas in Uganda is under smallholdings .The leaves of the growers are processed at the registered public companies tea factories with farmers as the shareholders.