Switching to raising eco-friendly pigs, an auto repair tycoon starts a new career in farming

On the south wing of the Hangzhou Bay Bridge, on stretches of saline-alkali land, a square "factory" has risen from the ground, rewriting the future of saline-alkali land.

This factory "produces" plants, so people call it a "plant dream factory."

"The vegetables grown here sell for a high price, but there is good reason for the high price," a staff member said with a smile. The lettuce grown here can sell for up to 30 yuan per jin, a full 15 times more expensive than ordinary lettuce.

The "plant dream factory" was built by the Ningbo Supply and Marketing Group with an investment of tens of millions of yuan, and planting began in 2015. The leafy vegetables it now produces have already entered many supermarkets and corporate canteens in Ningbo, Cixi and Yuyao. A test report issued by the Ningbo Academy of Agricultural Sciences shows that the leafy vegetables grown here have no pesticide or heavy metal residues.

Soilless cultivation, no longer depending on the weather

Plant factory, as a new agricultural technology term, means a factory that produces crops, integrating modern biotechnology, environmental control, materials science, protected horticulture and computer science, among other technologies.

This "plant dream factory" in Ningbo is formally named Ningbo Supply and Marketing Group Hangzhou Bay Ecological Agriculture Technology Co., Ltd. Luo Yajun, the company's production department manager, took the reporter on a tour of the huge "plant factory," introducing it along the way.

"This is the largest plant factory in the country by area," Luo Yajun said proudly. At present, only Wuxi has a 500 sq m experimental base in China, and it has not yet reached mass production. This plant factory has a total area of about 3,300 sq m, currently uses 1,600 sq m, and the vegetables produced have already begun to be sold.

Luo Yajun said that all the vegetables in the entire plant factory use soilless cultivation, introducing Japan's sunlight-type plant factory system, and automatically controlling temperature, humidity, light and nutrient solution and other environmental conditions throughout the entire process from seedling cultivation to production through computers. Plant growth in the facility is basically not restricted by natural conditions.

Pointing to a row of sprouts, he said: "These sprouts were sown on August 8, and have now grown to 3 cm, far exceeding the normal growth rate." They can grow so fast firstly because the sprout seeds are new varieties introduced from abroad, and secondly because high-tech cultivation methods are used.

Next to it is an 18 sq m "refrigerator." "This is a fully enclosed intelligent seedling room. Controlled by computer, it can maintain an internal temperature of 22°C and humidity of 55%..." In addition to constant temperature and humidity, there is also stable lighting. Six 13-watt lamp tubes are installed on each layer in the seedling room, starting at 7 a.m. every day and running for 12 hours to simulate a natural lighting environment. In addition, the small holes on the wall of the seedling room spray nutrient solution regularly for 10 minutes within a 60 cm range at 8 a.m. every day.

In a word, growing vegetables here uses high technology throughout.

Short growth cycle, high benefit per mu

Vegetable production is divided into three stages: sowing and seedling cultivation, planting, and harvesting. The young seedlings coming out of the seedling room are moved to a transparent and breathable greenhouse.

This seemingly ordinary greenhouse film is another major "magic tool" of this factory. The greenhouse uses Japan Mitsubishi UV-resistant drip-free PO agricultural film. Through its unique spectral system and strong drip flow property, it effectively prevents and suppresses pests and diseases, and can also regulate the temperature inside the greenhouse, ensuring the quality and quantity of vegetable production.

Walking into the greenhouse, you cannot find rows of soil beds. About 1 m above the ground, seedling beds made of foam boards look like patches of "aerial vegetable gardens," and the splashing of water can be heard from time to time.

Lifting the curtain of the seedling bed, the young seedlings are placed in small holes, and below the holes is circulating nutrient solution. It is understood that about 10 tons of nutrient solution are used in the greenhouse every day. Vegetables grown this way have a very short growth cycle, and each mu can be harvested once every 15 to 18 days, and the same mu of land can be replanted more than 10 times.

"In ordinary vegetable plots, the annual yield per mu is 1,500 kg to 2,000 kg. Using this soilless cultivation technology, the yield per mu can reach 16,000 kg," Luo Yajun said proudly. "Look, these greens and spinach planted at the end of July can already be harvested now, with an average daily output of 100 kg." A former auto repair factory boss originally worth more than 10 million yuan made a shocking move several years ago: he sold all his assets and went to the outskirts of Beijing to raise pigs.

This former "auto repair tycoon" is named Duan Xifeng. He now contracts 120 mu of land in Donggaocun Town, Pinggu District, and has taken up the lactic acid bacteria pig-raising method. In his Tengfengyuan Ecological Breeding Demonstration Base, the feed the pigs eat is all self-made lactic acid bacteria feed, in order to improve the pigs' immunity and intestinal health. The pigs raised this way have a growth cycle as long as 11 months, are of high quality, and are recognized by the market.

Walking into Duan Xifeng's lactic acid bacteria ecological pig-raising base, the bacteria-making room is clean and tidy, with several large white barrels placed inside. "Using soybean milk and other materials as culture medium, under a certain temperature and a certain fermentation time, the produced lactic acid bacteria can be added to the feed," Duan Xifeng said. Lactic acid bacteria are a kind of beneficial bacteria, and there are many kinds in the world. Several suitable strains need to be selected, while feed ingredients include soybeans, corn, bran and other grain crops.

"Entering the pig-raising industry was a bit unexpected, but also inevitable," said Duan Xifeng, now at the age of 40. His hometown is in Henan. Before going to Pinggu to run a pig farm, he had done logistics management in the military; after leaving the military, he ran an auto repair factory in Fengtai. After years of hard work, by 2008, his repair factory had an annual net income of more than 3 million yuan. Together with two properties and three cars, his total assets reached more than 20 million yuan.

However, in that very year, Duan Xifeng met an expert from an international ecological cooperation organization, who introduced him to a lactic acid bacteria ecological pig-raising method. Duan Xifeng, who had never had anything to do with agriculture, sold all his assets and invested all of the more than 20 million yuan into contracting land in the countryside to raise pigs.

Investing so much money in raising pigs, friends around him all said Duan Xifeng had gone "crazy." "In the first few years, the returns were very small. This kind of pig has high breeding costs and a growth cycle as long as 11 months, and the market did not recognize it," Duan Xifeng said. The first few batches of pigs were all sold to wholesale markets when they were ready for slaughter, sold the same as ordinary pork, and he lost a lot of money. At the most difficult time, Duan Xifeng borrowed money everywhere to pay his employees' wages.

Even so, unwilling to accept failure, Duan Xifeng still scraped together 100,000 yuan and invested it again in the breeding base, planting more than 8,000 ornamental trees, turning the base into a garden-style base, newly introducing more than 300 sows and 6 new varieties, with the number of pigs on hand reaching more than 5,000.

"The PH value of the lactic acid liquid is the key to making lactic acid bacteria and fermenting feed," Duan Xifeng said. The entire pig-raising process enhances the dissolving power, penetrating power, metabolic power and emulsifying power of water, thoroughly solving the functional degradation of water, making the nutritional function of water close to human cell water and keeping it in an activated state in the pig's body for a long time, which can maintain the pig's intestinal health and improve physiological functions.

"Now people pay special attention to food safety, and ecological pigs are gradually being accepted by the market," Duan Xifeng said. Today, the ecological pigs he raises are very popular and do not go through ordinary markets, but instead follow a high-end reservation route, with an annual output value of 30 million yuan.

Not long ago, 1,000 ecological piglets at Duan Xifeng's pig farm had already been adopted by citizens, each for nearly 6,000 yuan. "When they are born, a chip is implanted and earrings are attached. When they are ready for slaughter, citizens can choose to let the pig farm help sell them, or have them divided and taken home to eat themselves," Duan Xifeng said. At present, the pig-raising base is renovating pig pens and building an organic fertilizer production workshop. The organic fertilizer produced from pig manure will be used by the 38 vegetable greenhouses in the park and vegetable growers in the village, and an ecological pig-raising industrial chain is about to take shape.