An exhibitor gives a presentation of Puer tea to visitors at the ninth China Yunnan International Puer Tea Expo on May 9 in Kunming.[Photo by Lin Yiguang/Xinhua]

An exhibitor demonstrates primary tea frying during the ninth China Yunnan International Puer Tea Expo on May 9 in Kunming.[Photo by Lin Yiguang/Xinhua]

An exhibitor shows how to make Tuo tea, a kind of bowl-shaped compressed mass tea, at the ninth China Yunnan International Puer Tea Expo on May 9 in Kunming.[Photo by Lin Yiguang/Xinhua]

The ninth China Yunnan International Puer Tea Expo was held on May 9 in the Kunming International Convention and Exhibition Center, where more than 300 companies in the tea industry throughout the country presented for the four-day tea event. As the largest tea industry exhibition in Western China, the Yunnan tea expo now serves as a platform for exhibition, trade and cooperation surrounding Puer tea. Also, it helps to improve the brand image and popularity of the tea produced in Yunnan province. An ongoing increase in Puer tea price has been witnessed in recent years.

Yunnan is one of the major tea production provinces in China. Its tea plantations covered an area of 390,667 hectares in the province in 2013 with an output of 310,000 tons of primary tea in total.

Edited by Liu Yufen and Michael Thai