The Great Medicine King of the Yellow River Beach in Hejin, Shanxi
On the Yellow River beach in Hejin there is a father and daughter who have devoted their time and energy to 1200 mu of medicinal herb fields. The father handles management, the daughter handles sales, and they have sent piles of medicinal herbs out of Hejin and across the country, becoming a widely known "Great Medicine King." They are Yao Qingze and Yao Jiping, father and daughter.
Yao Qingze, 50 years old this year, is a native of Shangniu Village, Liwang Township, Wanrong County, and settled in Hejin City more than 20 years ago. At that time, Hejin was developing the saline-alkali land of the Yellow River beach around Lianbo. The keen-minded Yao Qingze spotted a business opportunity and early on contracted 1200 mu of beach land, mainly growing vegetables and grain, and intermittently growing medicinal herbs. When he first started growing vegetables and grain, due to lack of experience and the influence of external factors, his returns were sometimes good and sometimes bad. After several years of exploration, Yao Qingze gradually figured out the ropes. He found that growing medicinal herbs on the beach land was not only easy to manage, but also had a long sales period. In 2003, he made up his mind to change crops and began long-term cultivation of medicinal herbs.
Yao Qingze manages medicinal herbs as if he were caring for children, sparing no effort. Before planting any medicinal herb on a large scale, he first conducts a trial planting to observe the plant's yield, disease resistance and growth. Once, when trial-planting Xuanshen (Scrophularia ningpoensis), after two years of "looking after" it, he found that Xuanshen was still not suited to the local temperature environment, had poor disease resistance, and produced a large number of dead seedlings. Reluctantly, Yao Qingze cleared out all the Xuanshen seedlings and instead developed herbs such as Danshen (Salvia miltiorrhiza), Dihuang (Rehmannia), Banlangen (Isatis indigotica), Yuanzhi (Polygala tenuifolia), Chaihu (Bupleurum) and Jiegeng (Platycodon grandiflorus). Under his scientific management, the herbs he planted had a high survival rate and good quality, and were favored by the market. In 2012, he raised the banner and established the Daodi Medicinal Herb Planting Professional Cooperative, absorbing local members into the cooperative and vigorously developing medicinal herb cultivation.
Yao Qingze ran his herb growing impressively, but he had no spare energy to expand the market. His eldest daughter, Yao Jiping, graduated from Shanxi College of Traditional Chinese Medicine with a major in integrated Chinese and Western clinical medicine, and once served as an assistant physician at the city People's Hospital. Her father was busy in the fields all day, and the stored medicinal herbs piled up like a small mountain. She saw it and felt anxious. In 2010, she decided to resign and return home to help her father with the business, and began doing medicinal herb sales.
"Although I had studied some professional knowledge, I knew nothing at all about sales, and it took a lot of effort to reach the results I have now." In 2011, Yao Jiping took a train to Bozhou, Anhui, to investigate the market. Due to lack of experience, at the time she did not even know to bring herb samples, and only knew to go from one merchant to another. Sometimes after talking at length about this and that, the staff would only keep her business card, and afterward there would be no news at all. After running around like this for more than half a month, she was somewhat exhausted, yet did not dare to feel discouraged in the least. "After running around three or four times, someone will remember me," she said. Sure enough, hard work pays off, and half a month later there was a turn for the better. When she had already boarded the train and left Bozhou, preparing to go to the next city, a boss surnamed Zhu called to ask about her medicinal herbs. Yao Jiping told Boss Zhu that her family had several hundred tons of Danshen in storage. Boss Zhu was very surprised and could not believe it. With a try-it-and-see attitude, he decided to come to Hejin personally to take a look. One look gave him a shock: several hundred tons of medicinal herbs were right there before his eyes. Boss Zhu inspected the quality of the herbs, negotiated the price, confirmed the quantity, weighed and paid, and from then on established a long-term cooperative relationship.
"Sometimes opportunity comes just that suddenly. During that month of running around the market, I learned a lot and gradually got the hang of it," Yao Jiping said with deep feeling. Now the "Internet Plus" model is developing very quickly, and she also often uses WeChat groups and QQ groups to send some promotional advertisements. If a medicine merchant wants to inspect what the herbs are like, she sends samples by express delivery.
Happiness came very suddenly. The general manager of Guangdong Yuedong Pharmaceutical contacted her through a QQ group. "At first, when the general manager of Yuedong Pharmaceutical chatted with me, I always thought he was fooling me. Later he sent messages time and again wanting to cooperate. With a try-it-out attitude I sent samples over, and unexpectedly, not only did we become partners, but we also built a deep friendship." After the samples were received, the general manager of Yuedong Pharmaceutical contacted her by phone to discuss the price with Yao Jiping, and once they agreed, he immediately paid several hundred thousand yuan for the goods. "Even now when I think about it, I still feel a bit like I'm in a fog. I really can't believe we had never met, and I had not even shipped the goods yet, but they directly paid all the money for the goods," Yao Jiping said. To this day, all business dealings between the Daodi Medicinal Herb Cooperative and Yuedong Pharmaceutical are conducted by phone. The two sides have never met, yet this has not affected the development of the business in the least.
At present, under the meticulous management of the father and daughter, one mu of land can produce 6000 jin of Dihuang, and Danshen after drying can reach 300 kg. Their medicinal herbs have already been sold far away to Anguo in Hebei, Bozhou in Anhui, Zhendong in Shanxi, Huakang in Wanrong, Guangdong Yuedong Pharmaceutical, Hehuachi in Sichuan and other places.
The daughter Yao Jiping's sales business is booming, and the father Yao Qingze does not relax management either. Yao Qingze always selects excellent varieties, rotates sowing on time and by season, and ensures sufficient water and fertilizer to guarantee the quality of the medicinal herbs. Over all these years, they have encountered many problems in cultivation. "When planting Dihuang in 2012, after several heavy rains, the leaves withered severely. Because I did not clearly understand the pathogen, by the time I understood the cause, nearly one third of the seedlings had already died, causing serious losses," Yao Qingze said. Over more than 20 years, whenever he encountered problems, he would learn from other people with experience in growing medicinal herbs to enrich himself. Through constant summing up, he gradually figured out the methods for growing medicinal herbs and was able to solve many problems encountered in the growth process himself.
Yao Qingze is good at studying and innovating. Traditional machines spray medicinal herbs slowly and take a long time. To improve efficiency, he researched and designed mechanical spraying, which can spray nearly 500 mu a day. In 2015, he also personally went to Shandong and had a machinery manufacturer custom-make an automatic Danshen seeder to reduce the intensity of manual labor. Toward the villagers who work for him, Yao Qingze is amiable and friendly, making everyone feel as if they are in their own home. They rest when tired and drink when thirsty, and wages are settled daily, never delayed or docked. Toward neighboring peers engaged in cultivation, he also introduces experience without reservation. He even set up a WeChat group himself to help surrounding villagers solve practical problems online, teaching everyone some knowledge about pest and disease control in medicinal herb cultivation, winning unanimous praise from the villagers.
People fear becoming famous just as pigs fear growing fat. Yao Qingze truly became a medicinal herb management technical expert on the Yellow River beach land, even attracting a Spaniard. Land contracting costs in Spain are low. A Spaniard he had cooperated with before rented a lot of land in Spain and wanted to grow medicinal herbs. He came several times to invite him abroad to serve as a technical expert and offered a salary of 500,000 yuan per year. Faced with the generous reward, he still chose to refuse, because he could not bear to leave his home, and also his "children" that he had planted himself.
The father and daughter have always firmly believed that quality is reputation. One manages the inside, the other handles the outside, and quietly they have won the status of a local "Medicine King," driving the development of the local people. The Daodi Medicinal Herb Cooperative sells nearly 300 tons of medicinal herbs each month to Shanxi Zhendong Group and Guangdong Yuedong Pharmaceutical. Because of their good quality, they have been listed as exemption-from-inspection products by the two enterprises. Next, they will choose a site to build a factory, continue to expand the planting area, build new large warehouses and drying rooms, and carry out planning and reorganization, making the Daodi Medicinal Herb Cooperative more professional and automated, and striving to create a brand of their own.