How "Internet Plus" Is Changing the Model of China's Agricultural Industry Chain
Scattered farming by millions of households and the difficulty of supervising the quality and safety of agricultural products were once stubborn problems that were hard to crack in China's agricultural transformation. However, the group of “online farmers” - the link between small farmers and the big market - has unexpectedly begun to break through the problem.
Yang Xuemei, chairman of Yunyang Yunshan Agricultural Development Co., Ltd. of Yunyang County, Chongqing, is precisely such a new “online farmer” who uses standards to connect small farmers with the international market. From 2008 to now, Yang Xuemei, who gave up a high-paying job to return home and start a business, has led more than 3,000 farming households to plant over 10,000 mu of chrysanthemums. At the end of 2014, Yang Xuemei's company began online sales. In just one month, page views exceeded 10,000 and sales exceeded 300,000 yuan.
Yang Xuemei realized that for agricultural e-commerce companies, success comes from the internet and failure also comes from the internet. If even one of the more than 3,000 farming households growing chrysanthemums has a quality problem, it will destroy the entire company's reputation.
To this end, Yang Xuemei formulated strict organic chrysanthemum cultivation standards for the farmers at the base, and provided unified breeding, unified delivery of seedlings, unified planting technology, and unified purchasing standards.
In addition to “self-controlled” quality, Yang Xuemei also introduced external standards to grade and evaluate the base's products. Now the chrysanthemums at the base that have obtained EU organic certification are not only priced by the gram, but also exported overseas, and orders worth 400,000 pounds from the United Kingdom have already been received.
Wang Shouqiang, deputy director of the Market Construction Division of the Anhui Provincial Department of Commerce, believes that rural e-commerce currently mostly sells local specialties produced through scattered rural production. If there is a lack of effective quality control after entering e-commerce platforms for sale, it will directly affect the reputation and operations of online farmers. It is precisely because of recognizing this that more and more online farmers have begun to spontaneously act as “gatekeepers” of the quality and safety of agricultural products, and even advocates of agricultural product quality standards.
Wang Dong, an “online farmer” from Laibang Township, Yuexi County, Anhui Province, runs a small online shop on the Taobao platform selling local tea from Yuexi. The tea supply comes from scattered tea farmers in the township.
When talking about the quality of agricultural products, he admitted frankly that at first he accepted all the tea farmers brought, but later gradually realized that low-quality tea had a great impact on the online shop's reputation. Now, when purchasing tea, he pays more attention to quality standards, only buying high-mountain tea and tea with good picking techniques, and he insists on manual pan-firing.
Lin Songwen of the Zhejiang Suichang Online Shop Association believes that “online farmers” are an important force for improving the quality and added value of agricultural products. They connect to the market at the front end and to producing farmers at the back end, can promptly feed back to farmers the products needed in the market, and guide farmers to follow certain standards, forcing small and scattered farmers toward standardized production.
Data shows that in 2014, nationwide rural e-commerce sales exceeded 140 billion, and the number of rural online shops registered on the Taobao and Tmall platforms alone exceeded 1.6 million. By 2016, China's total rural online shopping market may exceed 460 billion yuan. In 10 or 20 years, the rural online shopping market may surpass the urban one.
The national action to bring e-commerce into rural areas is just starting. The Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Commerce recently issued a notice clearly stating that they will further promote the development of rural e-commerce.
“The agricultural transformation of ‘Internet Plus’ is only the beginning. With government support, industry efforts, and multi-party coordination, the domino effect of ‘online farmers’ will continue to deepen. In the next five to ten years, e-commerce will bring revolutionary changes to rural areas.” said Zhang Ruidong, a researcher at the Ali Research Institute.
Zhang Ruidong described the future vision: from consumers to distributors and then to producers, the internet will gradually empower the upstream. In the future, the internet, the Internet of Things, and big data will guide farmers' production, entering multiple links such as breeding, cultivation, fertilization, and irrigation, forcing the formation of “precision agriculture.”
Moreover, through the “QR code plus cloud computing” technology of e-commerce platforms, it will be possible to record and store all kinds of information in the agricultural product supply process, thereby realizing traceability of agricultural products. Ultimately, the internet will realize the reconstruction of the entire agricultural industry chain and promote the early arrival of agricultural modernization, Zhang Ruidong said.
Wan Baorui, an expert on agriculture, rural areas, and farmers, believes that “Internet Plus agriculture” is currently playing an important role in increasing agricultural output, raising farmers' incomes, and promoting the all-round development of rural society. Standing at the forefront of “Internet Plus,” future changes are still continuing.