of loose tea and tea bricks, enough tea to considerably lower the price so that middle and lower class Russians could afford the beverage. The word “tea” in Russian was first encountered in medical texts of the mid-17th century, for example, in “Materials for the history of medicine in Russia”: “herbs for tea; ramon color (?) - 3 handfuls each” (issue 2, No. 365, 1665, 291), “boiled (probably or the same, but through the Greek “scale”) to a leaf of Khinskiy (typo: khanskiy)”. The peak year for the Kiakhta tea trade was in 1824, and the peak year for the tea caravans was 1860. From then, they started to decline when the first leg of the Trans-Siberian Railway was completed in 1880. Faster train service reduced the time it took for tea to arrive in Russia from 16 months to seven weeks. The decline in Chinese tea in the mid 19th century in turn meant that Russia began to import more tea from Odessa, and London. By 1905, horse drawn tea transport had ended, and by 1925 caravan as the sole means of transport for tea had ended. In 2002, Russia imported some 162,000 metric tons of tea. By the late 19th century, Wissotzky Tea had become the largest tea firm in the Russian Empire. By the early 20th century, Wissotzky was the largest tea manufacturer in the world. By the end of the 18th century, tea prices had moderately declined. The first local tea plant was set in Nikitsk botanical gardens in 1814, while the first industrial tea plantation was established in 1885. The tea industry did not take off until World War I, and greatly expanded following World War II. However, by the mid 1990s, tea production came to a standstill. Today, the main area in Russia for tea production is in the vicinity of Sochi. Varieties Traditionally, black tea is the most common tea in Russia, but green tea is becoming more popular. Traditional tea in Russia includes the traditional type known as Russian Caravan as it was originally imported from China via camel caravan. As the trip was very long, usually taking as long as sixteen to eighteen months, the tea acquired its distinctive smoky flavor from the caravan's campfires. Today, this tea is often given its smoky flavor after oxidation or is a keemun or a "black or oolong from southern China or Formosa (Taiwan)