Tea saplings are loaded onto trucks and transported to the townships in need. At all levels, the governments and agricultural departments of Leishan County have adhered to the "Government Work Report" of the first session of the 16th Leishan County People's Congress and the "Leishan County Economic Work Conference", aiming to create a "Major Tea County in Guizhou". By 2016, the county plans to build high-quality tea gardens covering 90,000 mu (about 6,000 hectares), with an annual production of 3,500 tons of tea products, achieving a comprehensive output value of the tea industry reaching 800 million yuan, where the added value of the tea industry will account for more than 10% of the county's GDP. The tea industry will gradually become the mainstay industry for farmers to get rid of poverty and become wealthy. Just after the Spring Festival, a wave of land preparation and tea planting swept through the county. So far, the county has completed the land preparation for new tea gardens covering 5,370 mu (about 358 hectares), accounting for 89.5% of the 6,000-mu task. More than 8 million tea saplings have been distributed, with a planting area reaching 2,300 mu (about 153 hectares).
In recent years, the Leishan County Party Committee and County Government have followed the development concept of "supporting a strong enterprise, promoting a brand, cultivating a market, and forming a major industry." They have seized the opportunity of the national implementation of the Western Development Strategy, based on the actual conditions of the county, and focused on developing the tea industry as an important pillar industry for enriching the people and revitalizing the county. As a result, the scale of tea gardens has rapidly expanded, and the output and value of tea have increased year by year. By the end of 2011, the county's tea planting area reached 78,000 mu (about 5,200 hectares), with a harvestable tea garden area of 38,000 mu (about 2,533 hectares). The green tea output was 4,495 tons, and the dry tea output was 1,046 tons, with a product value of 158 million yuan, achieving sales revenue of 150 million yuan. Farmers' pure income from tea amounted to over 26 million yuan, with an average per capita income of 831 yuan for households engaged in tea cultivation. Growing, managing, and selling tea has become a path to wealth for farmers in mountainous areas.
To ensure the demand for seedlings for the construction of 6,000 mu of new tea gardens in the county in 2012, at the beginning of 2011, the Leishan County Tea Development Bureau actively organized skilled hands in asexual propagation of tea seedlings to rent more than 130 mu (about 8.67 hectares) of farmland in three villages—Zhi'an, Gu Lu, and Huangli—for seedling cultivation, which can produce 19.5 million tea seedlings. To seize the seasonal planting opportunities, various townships (towns) in the county have recently dispatched vehicles to transport tea seedlings from the nurseries to the newly established tea garden bases in each village for planting. (Zhang Xicai, Wu Xinghua)