Harvest season of spring tea arrives in Pu’er

It's the season for harvesting spring tea in Pu'er city in southwest Yunnan province. Many growers from different areas of the city are busy picking tea.

In Mt. Laoqing of Nanping town in Simao district, tea trees cover the mountain layer by layer with new born leaves. The Minle town of Jinggu Dai and Yi autonomous county has 93.4 thousand mu, or 62.26 km2 of tea gardens, and tea farmers are carrying baskets to pick spring tea.

"My family has a total of 20 mu of tea plantation now, and the spring tea sprouted early this year," said Jin Mei, a tea grower from Xingmin village of Minle town, at the tea purchase station.

“Today, three of us picked 19.6 kilograms of tea buds. The current market price is 35 yuan per kilogram, and we sold it for a total of 686 yuan,” added Jin.

From sun drying, frying, to kneading, the tea processing factory in the tea garden is bustling with each step carried out. To increase production and income of spring tea, Pu'er provides technological guidance to tea growers and tea enterprises.

As of 2023, the tea plantation area in Pu'er city reached 2.09 million mu, about 1333.93 km2, with a tea output of 144,600 tons and a comprehensive output value of 39.246 billion yuan. About 1.11 million tea farmers are involved in this industry.

Up to now, Pu'er has built 45 tea estates.

Source: Yunnan News; trans-editing by Wang Yunya