Caixin visited parts of North China known for their melons to get a look at the daily lives of the migrant workers who travel there every May to September to help with the harvest. Photo: Chen Liang/Caixin

Workers with headlamps pick melons from a field in Hami in the Xinjiang Uyghur autonomous region around 6 a.m. on Aug. 1. The city is the home to the famed Hami melons, which are known for being especially crisp, sweet and fragrant. Photo: Chen Liang/Caixin

The headlamps light up a field in Hami. Workers start picking the fruit at 4 a.m. to make sure the melons can be loaded onto cold chain containers before noon. Photo: Chen Liang/Caixin

Melons get picked, sorted and wrapped before they are loaded. Photo: Chen Liang/Caixin

As workers in Hami pick melons, another group of workers waits for melon seedlings to grow in Ejin Banner in North China’s Inner Mongolia autonomous region, 700 kilometers (435 miles) away from Hami. Photo: Chen Liang/Caixin

Workers grab a nap next to a melon field in Ejin Banner. Photo: Chen Liang/Caixin

Migrant workers gather at 4 a.m. for a job fair in the town of Dalahubu in Ejin Banner. Laborers from Gansu, Sichuan and Yunnan provinces have come to the town of 20,000 in search of work. Photo: Chen Liang/Caixin

Workers bargain for a higher wage with a foreman at a job fair in Hami at 5 a.m. Photo: Chen Liang/Caixin

Several migrant workers from North China’s Gansu province eat dinner in front of their rented house after the day’s work. Photo: Chen Liang/Caixin

Stacks of Hami melons wait to be transported to market. Photo: Chen Liang/Caixin

Tons of Hami melons sit waiting to be transported to a port in South China’s Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region, some 3,500 kilometers away. Photo: Chen Liang/Caixin