Ninghe District, Tianjin: The "Peach King" Who Led the Whole Village to Prosperity

“In the past two years, the peach trees have grown well. Take the Baifeng variety, for example: based on four years to fruit, one mu of land can yield 3000—4500 jin. Even selling at 10 yuan for 3 jin, you can bring in at least ten thousand yuan.” The speaker was none other than Ma Yongbao, the "Peach King" known to every household in Miaozhao Village, Miaozhuang Town, Ninghe District.

Ma Yongbao is a big name in Miaozhao Village. The land in Miaozhao Village is reclaimed sea-derived saline-alkali soil, which is suitable for growing peach trees. As a result, the village has a history of more than 40 years of peach cultivation, but today in the village, the most renowned figure is undoubtedly Ma Yongbao. After years of hard work and struggle, he has accumulated rich experience in peach growing. The peach trees he cultivates bear large, plump, sweet fruit, and when the villagers talk about Ma Yongbao, there is no one who does not applaud him.

A single flower does not make spring; a hundred flowers blooming together fill the garden with spring. Ma Yongbao, who grew rich by planting peaches, thought of the other villagers.

“In 2014, the state called for planting fruit trees and offered subsidies. At that time, the village Party secretary and village head came to me to discuss setting up a cooperative and leading everyone to prosperity together. This idea matched mine perfectly.” Ma Yongbao recalled the early days of founding the cooperative.

On January 25, 2015, the Baole Fruit Planting Professional Cooperative was established, led by Ma Yongbao, with 49 households of villagers joining.

“At the time I had only one goal: to make the whole village prosperous and to sell our peaches better and farther.” Ma Yongbao said.

The cooperative adopted a "unified management + individual operation" model, giving play to both the advantages of the collective and the initiative of individuals. In 2015, under Ma Yongbao's guidance, the villagers who joined the cooperative planted 38 peach trees per mu, with each tree yielding 150—200 jin. At a market price of 5 yuan per jin, the income was extremely considerable.

Seeing how thriving the cooperative's operation was, the villagers who had initially taken a wait-and-see attitude could no longer sit still and asked one after another to join the cooperative, but this put Ma Yongbao in a difficult position.

Village Party secretary Ma Yongle, on behalf of the villagers who wanted to join, went to Ma Yongbao, hoping to expand the cooperative and bring more villagers to prosperity. It was not that Ma Yongbao did not want to, but what if next year's harvest was poor, or the peaches were hard to sell? He was afraid of failing everyone's trust.

Secretary Ma understood Ma Yongbao's worries, but they both knew they could not give up the chance for the whole village to prosper just because of difficulties. The two worried over this matter a great deal. After repeated discussions, Ma Yongbao stopped hesitating and finally resolved to make the Baole Fruit Planting Professional Cooperative bigger and stronger.

Today, the number of farming households participating in the cooperative has reached 106, with a planting area of 1100 mu. Ma Yongbao is not only a local celebrity and a busy man, but also the most trusted capable man among peach farmers. He knows the planting situation of every household like the back of his hand, and whenever a family's peach trees have problems or a peach farmer runs into difficulties with planting techniques, their first reaction is to seek him out. As long as they find Ma Yongbao, the problem will surely be solved.

After more than a year of development, the cooperative has continued to grow. Building on the original foundation, Ma Yongbao has actively developed distinctive ecological agricultural products under the forest, which has become another new highlight of the village's development.