The Guardian

Japan prefecture to stop hiring female 'tea squad' for meetings

Saitama assembly hopes move will reflect changing attitudes towards women in workplaces
Female employees known as the ochakumi (‘tea squad’) often serve green tea before official gatherings. Photograph: Phethay Canthra Phun/Getty Images/EyeEm

A local government assembly is attempting to shake up Japan’s conservative workplace culture by ending the custom of employing women to serve tea at meetings.

Few official gatherings in have properly begun until female employees – known collectively as the (“tea squad”) – have placed cups of green tea in front of their invariably male

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