Villagers living in southwest China's Yunnan Province are learning new skills and adding winter crops to their fields to help them grow out of poverty.

Lancang Lahu Autonomous County, near Yunnan's Pu'er City, is an extreme poverty county and 156 out of its 157 villages are below the national poverty line. However, over 200,000 residents have been listening and learning over the past five years to gather a variety of expertise to expand their future outlook.

In Lancang's Huanghui Village, about 3,000 mu (about 200 hectares) of organic tea farmland has started to bring in a decent yearly income for residents.

A total of 380,000 mu (about 25,333 hectares) of tea is planted in Lancang, but the tea farm hadn't increased the farmers' income because there was a lack of usable technology and management. However, through the hard efforts of the farmers, various households were able to see an increase.

"In the past my tea only sold for two yuan per kilogram, and I even didn't have enough money to buy food," said Li Qiaomin, a villager and tea farmer.

Lancang County accelerated organic tea planting in a concentrated way starting in 2016, and tea farmers joined cooperatives to achieve more income. So far, there are 16 organic tea farms in the whole county.

Now, the price of fresh tea in Huanghui Village has reached 20 yuan per kilogram according to Liu Zefu, a village official.

Since 2016, agricultural experts from the Chinese Academy of Engineering have been working together with local authorities in Lancang to explore growing winter potatoes and vegetables, which is popular in the northern markets.

"Accumulated temperature of this area is very high in winter (which is good for growing plants), and it is such a waste to plant nothing during the winter season. We chose to promote the growth of winter potatoes here which has high value in winter. Villagers can earn a better income from transferring potatoes to north China after harvesting," said Zhu Shusheng, the dean of the Yunnan Agricultural University's College of Plant Protection.

Academicians from the academy taught villagers step by step to turn their spare winter fields into profits, and they also led villagers in learning how to grow Chinese ginseng, a more profitable Chinese medicine plant with a medicine wine factory being put into use in October of this year.

"I am so happy that I have learned new techniques. My family's income increased to 60,000 yuan compared to the past after growing Chinese ginseng," said Li Nanu, a local farmer of Lancang's Datangzi Village.

The team from the Chinese Academy of Engineering has delivered training to about 2,000 local villagers in various subjects, including farming and online sales, which has cultivated a group of technical talents and leaders toward prosperity in villages in the past five years. They will continue to teach local villagers to transfer from traditional farming to technological farming.

So far, 156 poverty villages have already gotten rid of poverty with their way of combining industry and techniques.