A young woman from Zhijin returns home to develop livestock farming and lead her fellow villagers to prosperity

On one side was the company that had trained her, offering a job with an annual salary of 150,000 yuan; on the other was the poor hometown that had raised her. Faced with this dilemma, she chose the latter.

Under her leadership, 6 households of villagers set up livestock farms, and all the workers she hired were poor households.

She is Zhang Hongmei, a "March 8th Red Banner Pacesetter" of Bijie City, just 30 years old.

In 2003, 17-year-old Zhang Hongmei of Yuejin Village, Banqiao Township, Zhijin County had just finished junior high school. Unable to continue her studies because her family was poor, she went alone to Fujian to work.

The place where Zhang Hongmei worked was a pig farm - Shuangyu Duroc Breeding Co., Ltd. The monthly wage of 500 yuan was not high, but she had inexhaustible energy and did all the dirty and heavy work. Three months later, this hardworking and eager-to-learn girl gained the company's favor, and it arranged for her to study at a school in Longyan, Fujian, learning agricultural planting and breeding techniques.

During her 3 years of study, she attended classes at school during the day and worked at the company's livestock farm at night. After graduating, Zhang Hongmei became the company's technical director, responsible for the breeding technology of 4 farms.

In early 2008, Zhang Hongmei returned to her hometown to give birth. Seeing the poverty of her hometown, she had the idea of staying, but in order to repay the company for training her, she still returned to Fujian and was promoted to farm manager.

Afterward, Zhang Hongmei served in turn as manager of the company's 4 farms, and the company's breeding scale grew to more than 400,000 pigs.

However, the poverty of her hometown kept weighing on her mind. In September 2013, Zhang Hongmei gave up a job with an annual salary of 150,000 yuan and returned to Xingfu Village, Banqiao Township, where her husband's family lived, to begin building a farm. In January 2014, the Hongmei Farm, with an investment of more than 800,000 yuan, was completed. Over the course of a year, Zhang Hongmei earned more than 200,000 yuan and also received the honor of being named a "March 8th Red Banner Pacesetter" of Bijie City.

In June 2015, the Xingfu Village Quail Breeding Professional Cooperative of Banqiao Township was established with registered capital of 1 million yuan, and the village committee entrusted Zhang Hongmei with its management and operation. She invested 260,000 yuan and returns 200,000 yuan to the village committee each year, completing the returns in 5 years, with profits split 30-70, of which she takes 30 percent. Now, the cooperative produces about 1,600 jin of quail eggs every day, at a market price of 6 yuan/jin, and demand exceeds supply.

The 12 workers hired by the cooperative are all poor villagers of Xingfu Village. Their basic wage is 1,800 yuan, and with commissions and other income, their average monthly wage is 3,000 yuan.

"I used to work away from home for a long time. From primary school to high school, I never once attended a parent-teacher meeting for my child," said worker Guo Jiaqin. Returning home to work allows her both to take care of her child and to earn no less than she did working elsewhere.

Zhang Hongmei not only provides jobs, but also uses her own skills and experience to solve villagers' problems and help them prosper together. In May 2014, all 20 pigs raised by Sun Huazhong of Zhongxin Village, Banqiao Township, were suffering from skin peeling. Zhang Hongmei injected the pigs with vitamins, allowing them to grow up strong and healthy. Early last year, under Zhang Hongmei's guidance, Sun Huazhong invested 150,000 yuan and expanded 9 pig pens to 40, raising 120 pigs, and in the first quarter of this year he earned more than 100,000 yuan.

Zhang Hongmei, warm-hearted and highly skilled, led the villagers onto the road to prosperity through livestock farming, and was affectionately called the "livestock farming beauty" by the villagers.