Hong Yunhai Farms with Heart, Growing a "Conscience" Field, and Being a Down-to-Earth Grain Farmer

Hong Yunhai, a major grain grower in Tonggong Township, Changshan County, is a widely known expert at farming. In 2016, he transferred 750 mu of farmland and made a grain-growing profit of 350,000 yuan, making him one of the standout major grain growers in the county.

From Tractor Driver to Grain Grower

"Farming requires science, and even more so, conscience." On January 20, at Hong Yunhai's Lehai Family Farm, he told reporters that last year he transferred 750 mu of farmland, of which 300 mu each were planted with early rice and late rice, 400 mu with ratoon rice, and more than 50 mu with single-season rice. After deducting costs, the grain-growing profit was 350,000 yuan. "With national policy subsidies, grain farming is still decent."

Hong Yunhai is from Jinchuanyuan Village, Tonggong Township. He is 40 years old this year and is a widely known expert at farming.

"I was able to take the path of large-scale grain farming, and that is inseparable from my father's support." Hong Yunhai explained that when rural land was contracted to households, his family received more than 7 mu of good farmland. His father, Hong Shunguo, was a skilled farmer, and later, through leasing, by 2000 the family had expanded to more than 20 mu of grain fields.

Hong Yunhai was originally a tractor driver hauling freight. Influenced by his father from childhood, he had a certain technical foundation in grain farming. In 2003, while hauling freight, he also worked the 20 mu of land with his parents and wife.

"In 2004, in order to keep up with the farming season, we bought a harvester, and I stopped hauling freight and devoted myself entirely to grain farming." Hong Yunhai and his wife were educated, and his father had experience growing rice. Combining the new and the old, after more than ten years of hard work, what was once a son helping his father farm is now a father assisting his son farm, achieving a generational handover in grain farming.

Scientific Management, Mechanized Grain Farming

"I truly tasted the sweetness of mechanized farming, and it started with large-scale rapeseed planting." In 2007, Hong Yunhai contracted more than 500 mu of land and planted early rice. During that period, he also planted more than 100 mu of rapeseed.

He said that at the time, he dared to plant so much rapeseed entirely because of machinery. He used machinery to open the furrows, then direct-seeded the rapeseed into the soft field. When the rapeseed matured, he drove the harvester to reap it, finishing the harvest in two days, saving effort and time and reducing labor costs. "That year the rapeseed oil price was good, with a profit of 400 yuan per mu." After that, he planted 100 to 200 mu of rapeseed every year.

In 2010, Hong Yunhai began exploring the scientific grain-farming model of "early rice + ratoon rice." That year, the early rice yield reached 450 kg per mu, and the ratoon rice yield also reached 150 kg per mu.

After years of practice, in 2016 the early rice he planted reached an average yield of 550 kg per mu, and the ratoon rice yield reached as high as 325 kg per mu. "To increase ratoon rice yields, the key is fertile fields." Hong Yunhai analyzed that in the week before harvesting the early rice, he applies 15 kg of urea per mu, and after the early rice is harvested, he fertilizes again. Precisely because the soil fertility is high, the ratoon rice grows vigorously.

In 2013, Hong Yunhai founded "Changshan Lehai Family Farm," achieving a splendid transformation with expanded farming scale, gradually standardized management, and production as mechanized as possible. Today, the farm uses fully mechanized operations from cultivation, sprouting, seedling raising, transplanting, pest and disease control, harvesting, transport, drying, and storage.

Farming a "Conscience" Field Brings Joy Amid Hardship

"In the past, when farming at scale, the hardest part was drying the rice." In 2007, his early rice planting area reached more than 500 mu. Calculating at 400 kg of wet grain per mu, that meant more than 200,000 kg of grain had to be turned and dried by hand, which required a great many drying yards.

While harvesting, he transported the wet grain to places such as the entrance of the factory buildings in the Xindu Industrial Park, 3 km from his village, to turn and dry it. He spread it out in the morning, gathered it up at night, and it took 3 consecutive days of turning and drying to get it dry. One day in late July, the sky was clear in the morning, but at noon it suddenly changed. A fierce wind rose and torrential rain poured down. The 20,000 kg of rice spread out at the entrances of the various factory areas was in an instant scattered in all directions by the storm, causing direct economic losses of more than 40,000 yuan.

In 2009, he transferred more than 800 mu of land for grain farming. After the rice was cut, during the day he and his father harvested while spreading the rice to dry on the road, and at night they set up a shed by the roadside and took turns keeping watch, sleeping that way for 4 months.

"That hardship was unlike anything before." The next year, Hong Yunhai made a firm resolution to build a warehouse and buy a dryer.

Through site selection, planning, and approval, he planned to build a warehouse integrating the placement of farm machinery, storage of rice, mechanical seedling raising, and grain drying. Building the warehouse required an investment of 800,000 yuan, plus 600,000 yuan for equipment, totaling 1.4 million yuan. In addition to self-raised funds and bank loans, there was still a gap of 800,000 yuan. The couple rushed around raising money, from his wife's family to his own family, from friends to colleagues, from day to night, before finally gathering the full amount. Facing hardship, Hong Yunhai said, "Many irresistible natural disasters and the vexing matters in the process of development all have to be overcome, endured, and solved by oneself."

Having solved the problems of drying rice and storing grain, the path of scientific grain farming grew broader and broader, and the further he walked, the sweeter it felt.

"Now I have 3 seedling-raising assembly lines and 4 dryers." Hong Yunhai said that each year the seedling-raising area reaches 5,000 mu. In addition to drying rice for his own farm, he also dries more than 1,000 tons of rice for other farming households, and pays 200,000 yuan in hired labor wages each year.

"Grain farming is not only about science, but even more about conscience. When I grow rice, pest and disease control is unified prevention and control, and pests are treated only twice. The rice is reassuring in quality and delicious." What delights Hong Yunhai most is that in recent years, the farm's high-quality rice has sold for 10 yuan per kg.

In 2016, he planted 50 mu of japonica rice. At a price of 10 yuan per kg, he has already sold more than 10,000 kg of rice, with only 10,000 kg of paddy left unsold.

"This year, seedling raising is expected to start in March, and 700 mu of early rice will be planted." Hong Yunhai is increasingly confident about grain farming.