On the outskirts of Bolao town, five minutes down an overgrown dirt track into the jungle of southern China's Guangxi region, Mr Hua Chaojiang breeds cobras by the hundred.

An acrid smell and a chorus of angry hisses meet us when we step into the darkness of the three-storey red-brick building. Mr Hua, who has been raising snakes for 20 years, is unfazed. He reaches into one of the pens, grabs a tail and casually lifts up a complaining - and venomous - elapid snake. The four-year-old cobra is about as thick as Mr Hua's muscled arm and nearly twice as long. He laughs when asked whether the poisonous snakes have ever bitten him. "Of course," he replies, using a metal pole with a hook to keep its fangs away from his body.