From dawn till dusk they toil in the fields, their hands plucking leaves that will please millions of palates

For the Dong ethnic group in Liping, a county in Guizhou province, April is a busy time. Twenty days or so in that month are regarded as the optimum time to pick tea, of which the county produces 7,200 metric tons a year.

Teams of harvesters head for plantations before sunrise, and return to the collection depot at sunset, when their pay for the day will be calculated.

Tea picking in the county relies on hands, 60,000 pairs of which descend on the plantations every year. Each worker is paid 40 yuan a kilogram, and the average daily pay is about 100 yuan.

Finding pickers has become increasingly difficult in recent years. The tough, energy sapping work has little appeal to young people, so most of the pickers are middle-aged women or older people.

(China Daily European Weekly 04/18/2014 page4)