Hubei Zhushan professional farmer Huang Zuwu returns home to start a business and brings prosperity to fellow villagers

The autumn breeze brings coolness, and ripe fruit fills the air with fragrance. At the kiwifruit base in Zongbing'an Village, Majiadu Town, Zhushan County, Hubei Province, dense clusters of kiwifruit hang from the branches, a truly delightful sight. Huang Zuwu, the delighted person in charge of the base, is grinning from ear to ear.

Huang Zuwu, 44 this year, is a true farmer from Baofeng Town, Zhushan County. He worked away from home for many years, doing masonry work and contracting construction projects. He can endure hardship and wants to get rich, and even more wants to lead his fellow villagers out of poverty toward prosperity.

In 2012, he saw large-scale kiwifruit cultivation in Xing'an County, Sichuan, and at that time he had the idea of returning to his hometown to develop the kiwifruit industry. He acted as soon as he spoke of it. Where should the base be located? Choosing Zongbing'an Village was absolutely the right call.

In 2014, Huang Zuwu seized the opportunity, transferred land through circulation, and registered and established Run'an Family Farm to develop the kiwifruit industry, with registered capital of 1 million yuan, focusing on 5 varieties: Hongyang, Xuxiang, Cuixiang, Jinguo, and Hayward. Through nearly a year of effort, the 300 mu of kiwifruit he developed in Gaojiapo, Group 2 of Zongbing'an Village bore fruit and went on the market.

As the industry began to show results, how could he lead his fellow villagers to truly escape poverty and become prosperous? He took the initiative to hold many discussions with the two committees of Zongbing'an Village and representatives of the villagers. With the care and support of the town Party committee and government, he tried the "market cooperation and win-win" model (that is, the "five-three-two" profit-sharing model), adopting the operating mechanism of "government guidance, departmental coordination, project support, company leadership, and farmer participation," establishing a kiwifruit professional cooperative, building a kiwifruit industry demonstration park, and completing a cold storage facility.

The Zongbing'an Village committee transferred 1000 mu of land in a concentrated contiguous block and contracted it out as a whole for 3 years to build the kiwifruit industrial park. After it reaches full production, Huang Zuwu will return the transferred area to the farmers to manage and produce on their own, the village committee will be responsible for assisting management, and he will be responsible for external market and technical guidance services, and will organize product buyback and packaging sales at the initial market price.

At present, there are 60 farmers "working" at the kiwifruit base, with an average annual income of 15000 yuan per person. After the kiwifruit industrial park reaches full production, the yield per mu can reach 2500 kg. Calculated at 15 yuan/jin, the output value per mu can reach 75000 yuan, making it a major pillar industry for prosperity in Zongbing'an Village.

While developing the industry, Huang Zuwu always pays attention to helping the village's poor households escape poverty. After the village's poor households were identified last year, he took in 45 poor households from Group 1 of the village, both transferring their land and letting them work on the farm, thereby increasing their income and confidence in becoming prosperous.

The elderly couple Cai Shihua, 66, is one of these households, and their life is now full of flavor; this year they are preparing to build a new house. The elderly couple is old and weak, and no one wanted to hire them for work away from home. They relied on a little more than 4 mu of farmland to make a living, and as they grew older, farming also became difficult. Since Run'an Farm was established, their land transfer payment alone compensated them more than 2000, and last year the couple worked on the farm for more than 3 months and earned 16000 yuan.

"In future development and construction, we will further strengthen the management of the industrial park, raise the standards for building the park, deepen product processing, and form an integrated industrial development model of production, supply, and sales. We will build a kiwifruit product processing factory to achieve deep processing of kiwifruit products, so as to increase product added value and make kiwifruit a 'golden fruit' for the masses to increase income and become prosperous." Huang Zuwu is full of confidence.