Reflecting on a five-year tenure as an agricultural deputy in the national legislature, veteran tea executive Liu Wenxin shared poignant insights into the enduring struggles, triumphs, and aspirations of smallholder farming families across China’s tea mountains.
1. Infrastructure as the Gateway to Origin Value
Throughout the five-year period, persistent policy advocacy focused on resolving basic mountain logistics:
- Constructing paved mountain access roads connecting remote ethnic minority villages with regional highway corridors;
- Establishing reliable three-phase electrical grids in high-elevation hamlets to power standardized fresh leaf aeration and fixation machinery;
- Installing broadband communication towers enabling mountain growers to conduct live field broadcasts and access real-time market pricing.
2. Ensuring Equitable Compensation
Liu stressed that an enterprise’s true moral benchmark is measured by how much value returns to the soil. Fair farmgate purchasing agreements ensure that growers receive living wages, incentivizing careful manual harvesting over destructive stripping.
3. Sustaining the Heritage of the Leaf
Looking ahead, the deputy reaffirmed that genuine industry prosperity begins with deep reverence for the agrarian families whose calloused hands pick each tender spring flush at dawn.
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