Watermelon prices are like a roller coaster: a frontline investigation shows melon farmers' joys and sorrows differ

Xinhua News Agency, Changchun, August 12 -- Watermelon prices are like a “roller coaster”, and melon farmers' joys and sorrows differ

Xinhua reporters Li Shuangxi and Lin Hong

Recently, several major watermelon-producing areas in Jilin Province experienced a “roller coaster” ride in prices. Within a few days, prices suddenly fell from 0.4 yuan to 7 fen per jin, tens of thousands of jin of watermelons rotted in the fields, and the “regular buyers” who purchased melons all disappeared. Why did prices fall to 7 fen this year? The reporter interviewed several major watermelon-producing areas including Taonan, Changling and Gongzhuling.

Last year 0.7 yuan, this year 7 fen: melon farmers want to cry but have no tears

On the 10th, beside a village road in Jinshui Village, Changling County, a trailer loaded with 70,000 jin of watermelons headed for Xinmin, Liaoning. On the face of 36-year-old melon farmer Huang Liu was an expression of wanting to cry but having no tears.

Huang Liu planted a total of 7 hectares of watermelons this year, with each hectare producing 120,000 jin and costs of about 30,000 yuan, equivalent to watermelons needing to sell for about 0.25 yuan per jin. However, this year his early melons were sold at 7 or 8 fen, and he lost a total of 150,000 yuan.

Pointing to the rotting watermelons by the roadside, Huang Liu said that in the past even the leftover small melons had people buying them, but this year 30,000 to 40,000 jin were thrown away.

Jiang Hua, a melon farmer and broker in Gongzhuling, felt much the same. Last year, merchants buying melons had to pay a 20,000 yuan deposit, and prices reached as high as 0.78 yuan per jin, while this year no one wanted them even at 7 fen.

Jiang Hua has more than 30 “regular buyers”, long-term merchant partners who purchase melons, from places including Shandong, Hebei, Zhejiang and Shanghai. Jiang Hua said that in previous years, by July 20 the “regular buyers” would rush over to buy melons, but this year no matter how he called, no one showed up. With no one buying watermelons, prices within Jilin Province kept falling.

According to price monitoring by China Good Melon Network, before July 28, watermelon quotes in Jilin Province were 0.3 yuan-0.4 yuan, while after August 2 they generally fell to 0.07 yuan-0.1 yuan. On August 10, prices rebounded to 0.2 yuan-0.25 yuan.

“It's no use even if prices come back. Most of what we planted this year were early melons, all coming to market in late July and early August. Now there is hardly any left.” Huang Liu said that after growing watermelons for more than 10 years, this was the first time he had encountered such low watermelon prices.

No one from out of town came to buy, and local consumption was limited. Lei Jing, a melon farmer in Shanwan Village, said one truckload of melons was 70,000 jin, sold to the south, two truckloads per day. If they were sold on the local market, one truckload could not be sold in 20 days, and in the end they would still rot in the truck. For watermelons that rely heavily on out-of-town markets, having no one buying melons is equivalent to throwing them all away.

Melons everywhere, too many to harvest: “regular buyers” helpless

“So many, I've never seen so many watermelons, they're everywhere.” A buyer from Xinmin, Liaoning, leaned in his car and said helplessly.

According to reports, watermelon purchasing proceeds from south to north each year. In previous years early melons made money and late melons lost money, so this year farmers everywhere rushed to plant early melons. In addition, Jilin Province suffered wind and hail disasters of varying degrees in June, delaying the watermelon ripening period, causing early melons in many places to come to market at the same time and prices to plummet.

“Many ‘regular buyers’ stayed in Liaoning and Inner Mongolia to snap up melons, while Jilin, which is farther away, was ignored.” the Xinmin buyer said.

Second, because corn prices fell, Jilin Province reduced its corn planting area and switched to cash crops. Many farming households set their sights on watermelons, which had been “highly profitable” in previous years.

Wang Dahua, manager of Dahua Seed Industry in Changling County, said one box of watermelon seeds can plant 1 mu of land. Last year a total of 4,000 boxes of seeds were sold, while this year it reached 10,000 boxes, equivalent to a 60 percent increase in planting area.

“Many new melon farmers lack sales channels and have no ‘regular buyers’. When early melons come to market, they look everywhere for brokers to sell on their behalf, which also drags down market prices.” Jiang Hua said.

Mastering market sales channels: Zhejiang melon farmers are not worried about selling

43 hectares of melon fields, a sea of melons stretching as far as the eye can see. Pan Xiaochun, a melon farmer from Ruian, Zhejiang, who rents this patch of melon land in Changling County, appears very calm about the rise and fall of melon prices.

Having been a “regular buyer” for 35 years, Pan Xiaochun sells watermelons from the Northeast to Wenzhou, Jiaxing, Jinhua and other places in Zhejiang. This year is his first year growing melons, yet he is not worried about low prices and losses.

“My greatest asset is not melon-growing technique, but the market.” Pan Xiaochun said that when many melon farmers could not find “regular buyers” and could only dump watermelons at 7 or 8 fen, he could directly load watermelons onto trucks and sell them to Zhejiang, with an average on-site price of 0.6 yuan per jin, and after deducting transport costs he could still earn 0.2 yuan.

Pan Xiaochun's second lesson is to spread his bets across different time periods. In May this year, he saw melon farmers everywhere rushing to plant early melons and worried that early melons would be cheap, so he planted only about 5 hectares, and planted late melons on the rest. “I still have more than 30 hectares of late melons unsold, and can catch a good price.”

Pan Xiaochun said that because watermelons have long sales channels and a high degree of marketization, various middlemen and consignment sellers form a huge group, earn consignment fees, and “eat up” much of farmers' profits. Therefore, having direct sales channels and no middlemen taking a cut is the magic weapon for making steady profits without losses this year. (End)