Specialty Fruit Helps Yangping Village Get on the Path to Poverty Alleviation and Prosperity

In the vast stretches of citrus orchards in Yangping Village, Bayang Town, Yunyang County, Chongqing, a busy figure can often be seen weaving through the trees. Whether pruning and spreading branches or watering and fertilizing, every movement is skillful, nimble, and meticulous. This person is Xiong Dedong, a household name in Yangping Village. When people talk about him, they cannot help but give a thumbs-up. The story of how he diligently learned fruit tree management and care techniques and “taught others to fish,” leading the villagers to develop the citrus fruit industry and increase their income, begins with the development history of Newhall navel oranges in Yangping Village.

Fourteen years ago, after Xiong Dedong's older brother Xiong Defu became the village Party secretary of Yangping Village, in order to lead everyone to prosperity, he decided after extensive research to guide everyone in improving cultivation by planting Newhall navel oranges. However, Yangping Village had grown red tangerines since ancient times. The villagers could not accept this at first, so Xiong Defu cultivated seedlings himself, piloted the trial first, distributed seedlings, and provided technical guidance. After experiencing countless hardships, everyone finally decided to trial-plant Newhall navel oranges.

However, misfortune befell them. In the second year of trial planting, Xiong Defu fell gravely ill and passed away. For the entire Yangping Village, this was an immense sorrow. For a time, the Newhall navel orange industry in Yangping Village lost its backbone, the villagers lost their “bellwether,” and the village had no technician. For the vast majority of villagers who had just pinned their hopes on the Newhall navel orange saplings but lacked sufficient experience in fruit tree management and care techniques, this was undoubtedly the hardest fact to accept.

The villagers' helplessness and worry plunged Xiong Dedong into deep grief and contemplation. Whenever he closed his eyes, he would see scenes of his brother leading everyone to prosperity and earnestly persuading them to switch to planting Newhall navel oranges. He decided to turn grief into strength, to fulfill his brother's last wish, to honor the promise made to the people, to become an excellent agricultural technician, and to lead everyone in continuing to develop Newhall navel orange cultivation well, so as to increase villagers' production and income and set them on the path to poverty alleviation and prosperity.

“At that time, my brother was the only technician in the whole village. After he passed away, everyone was completely in the dark when it came to planting Newhall navel oranges. The village urgently needed this kind of talent. So I worked hard to read the management logs and technical books my brother had written during his lifetime, learning and figuring things out through practice as I went. I applied the theoretical knowledge I learned to my own fruit trees, and after verifying it, I passed on what I had learned to the villagers.” Xiong Dedong said, pointing to the thick stack of notebooks and materials his brother had left behind.

Through continuous learning and exploration, Xiong Dedong mastered the scientific planting and management techniques for Newhall navel oranges. But he found that not many villagers actively came to consult him. Most only sought him out for “rescue” after their own attempts had failed, rather than carrying out management and prevention in advance. He offered free fruit tree cultivation and management training classes in the village, promptly sharing the experience he had summarized and the results of his research with the villagers.

Over several years, through mastering practical scientific management knowledge and techniques, the villagers followed Xiong Dedong in the fields, carrying out careful management for fruit trees at different seasons and important growth stages, from fertilizing, pruning, flower and fruit thinning, to pest and disease control, attending to every step. Everyone found that Newhall navel orange yields were higher, quality was better, and income had increased. Yangping Village became a widely known fruit village.

In order to keep pace with the changing market, Xiong Dedong began studying modern orchard management. He persisted in regularly holding fruit tree cultivation and management training classes in the village, passing on modern orchard development trends, management models, and labor-saving cultivation techniques to the villagers, advancing the citrus industry toward large-scale and diversified development.

Xiong Dedong keenly captured business opportunities. Using his own orchard for experiments, he called on villagers to combine retail and wholesale, and to open fruit-picking tours to the public, carrying out diverse marketing experience activities such as “Happy Picking” and “Happy Farm,” letting consumers personally experience the joy of harvest and the fruits of labor while also solving the problem of difficult sales of agricultural products and increasing farmers' income.

It is reported that as of 2015, Yangping Village had 5000 mu planted with citrus, loquat, and other specialty fruits, achieving a total agricultural output value of 60 million yuan, with the per capita net income of villagers reaching 12,000 yuan. The rural ecological environment was good, and the farmers lived in harmony and happiness.

Liu Lian, excerpted from Hualong Net