It does nothing with "hostile". For China, yes, but for most other countries tariff is simply ($USA-import - $USA-export)/$USA-import. That simply, numbers are check for many many countries. I'm sure, USA imports a lot of tea from Sri Lanka and some fruits and wood/furniture.
(Freshly made Sri Lankian tea is the best, IMHO! I mean, proper tea, not all these grasses, berries and synthetic aromas which are named "tea" in modern western world).
Unfortunately, no, as I've changed country of living year ago and still can not find way to good tea in new place. Also, I'm not sure, that recommendations from Europe is actual for you even if I have one.
But really best "black" tea of my life (and I spent most of my life in country with strong tea culture, where loose tea and teapots are still very popular, and not, it is not UK!) was bough at random tea factory in the middle of nowhere in Sri Lanka, packed in simple 1kg vacuum bags. No brand, no name, only date of picking (two days ago) and packing (today at the day of bought) :-)
As a local, the brand called Dilmah is just a regular supermarket brand for us, but I hear it's quite popular in places like Australia and New Zealand.
Yeah, they are the poshest tea shop in London, of course they're expensive. If you know of a more affordable place with shipping and high quality, I'm all ears.
It is THE problem for me: tea become "posh" in Europe. You have tea dust from Lipton in bags on one end of the spectrum, posh tea which costs about 100x to its origin (26€/$ per 50g! 520€ for a kilo! It is insane, it is lifestyle price, not food/grocery price!) on the other end of the spectrum and nothing in-between.
Ok, Germany or Netherlands never were known for tea tradition, but UK was THE Tea country. UK created Assam, Darjeeling, Ceylon teas in the first place! How did this happen?
Do we speak about "black" ("red" in Chinese classification) tea?
To be honest, I've tried many red teas from China and all of them... Very Chinese.
It is not bad at all (some of them are very interesting!, but it is other style compared to Ceylon, Darjeeling and Assam teas (which are not the same too, but close to each other than to Chinese red tea).
Different styles of green ad white teas I like too, but as specialty, not on as day-to-day many-time-a-day go-to drink.
(Freshly made Sri Lankian tea is the best, IMHO! I mean, proper tea, not all these grasses, berries and synthetic aromas which are named "tea" in modern western world).