Pigeon breeder Zhao Kaiming Hopes to Release 30,000 Homing Pigeons at the Winter Olympics

Zhao Kaiming holds a homing pigeon in his hand and smiles happily.

"I have a dream: to take the 30,000 homing pigeons I have raised and take part in the opening ceremony of the 2022 Winter Olympics," said Zhao Kaiming, manager of Zhangjiakou Wanquan District Qingxiang Livestock Co., Ltd. In April this year, he and his partners invested 6 million yuan to start building a modern homing pigeon farm in Ximalin Town, Wanquan District, covering 70 mu and raising 30,000 homing pigeons. It is expected to be completed in August.

Opening a Coal Yard to Dig Up the First Pot of Gold

On May 20, the sun blazed fiercely. After the car left Ximalin Town and bumped along a country road for half an hour, we arrived at the construction site of the modern homing pigeon farm of Zhangjiakou Wanquan District Qingxiang Livestock Co., Ltd. Manager Zhao Kaiming was fighting alongside the construction workers on the front line.

Zhao Kaiming is 31 years old and a native of Shenjingbao Village, Kongjiazhuang Town, Wanquan District. In 2004, after graduating from the Municipal Vocational Education Center, he began learning car repair in Kongjiazhuang Town. Because he was smart and eager to learn, he finished his apprenticeship a year later and became a manager himself, opening an auto repair shop mainly engaged in tire sales, paint baking, sheet metal work and other services.

Thanks to honest operation, superb skills and reasonable prices, customers came in an endless stream to have their cars repaired at his shop, and business was booming.

"I am still young, and going out to brave the world will be good for my future development." In 2007, with this idea, Zhao Kaiming went alone to Hohhot, Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, to try his luck, driving a small vehicle at a coal yard for a monthly wage of 1,200 yuan.

In 2009, Zhao Kaiming went to Baotou and, together with others, invested a total of 8 million yuan to build a coal yard, mainly selling industrial coal. At that time, running a coal yard was very profitable: low investment, high profit, and coal was sold all over the country. Four years later, he had earned more than 1 million yuan. In 2013, as the state protected and improved the environment, a large number of roadside coal yards were shut down, and Zhao Kaiming's coal yard was closed as well.

After drifting away from home for several years, the prospects of his hometown's economic development attracted him back.

In October 2013, he returned to Wanquan from Baotou and went back to his old trade, opening an auto repair shop in Ximalin Town.