Workers make tea by hand in Guizhou. [Photo/weixin.qq.com]

Since Hu Jicheng, member of the Guizhou Agriculture Committee and executive deputy director of the Guizhou Tea Office, was interviewed for the “2017 Xinhuanet Special Interview”, the popularity of Guizhou tea is on the rise.

“The tea Hu Jicheng drank during the interview was produced by my company,” said Zhou Mingrong, president of Qianxinan Muzhixin Tea Culture LLC.

The Qianxinan Bouyei and Miao autonomous prefecture of Guizhou province boasts thousands of years of history in tea planting, due to its extraordinary geographic conditions. Spring tea from the prefecture is able to hit markets almost two months earlier than other places in China, due to the medium altitude and high humidity of the region’s planting fields.

The tea plantations in the prefecture reached a gross of 294.7 square kilometers by December, 2016, bringing an annual income of 487 million yuan ($70.4 million). Tea plantations have become a pillar industry for poverty alleviation in the prefecture. Qinglong county, Puan county and Xingyi county have been given the title of key provincial tea industry counties, to better develop Qianxinan’s tea brand advantage.

Farmers work on Guizhou’s tea plantations. [Photo/weixin.qq.com]