Returning home to grow tea brings high income and lets them care for their families without worries
Original headline: Villagers return home to grow tea, earning high income while caring for family
Luotang Village in Baitang, Boluo, embarks on a path out of poverty toward prosperity through "one village, one industry, one product"
Every household in Luotang Village grows tea, and everyone loves tea. Photo by our reporter Li Songquan
Luotang Village, Baitang Town, Boluo County, is a village that escaped poverty by growing mountain tea. It has a permanent population of more than 2,200 people and 2,000 mu of mountain tea, with an annual output value of 30 million yuan. From mountain tea alone, the per capita annual income exceeds 10,000 yuan, achieving both escape from poverty and prosperity.
It is reported that, with the assistance of the Taiwan Affairs Office of the Municipal Party Committee and Huizhou Motor Transport Group, Luotang Village has embarked on a path out of poverty toward prosperity through "one village, one industry, one village, one product." As of the end of last year, the village's annual collective economic income had risen from 26,500 yuan before the assistance to 110,000 yuan, achieving the poverty alleviation goal.
2,000 mu of tea gardens with an annual output value of 30 million yuan
The reporter saw in Luotang Village that tea hills rose one after another, a spectacular sight. In the village, every household grows tea and everyone loves tea; tea gardens and tea hills are right outside the door, and the tea brewed inside is mountain tea.
Guan Haiyan was once a poor household in the village. Before growing mountain tea, she worked at a battery factory elsewhere, which was not only hard but also kept her away from home year-round, unable to care for her family. "Now growing tea not only brings a high income, but also lets me care for my family," Guan Haiyan happily told the reporter. After returning to the village, she planted 2 mu of mountain tea and earns more than 30,000 yuan a year. Now her child is already in university, and life keeps getting better.
The reporter learned that Baitang Town has the largest mountain tea planting area in the city and was named one of "Guangdong's Top Ten Tea Townships" last year. According to statistics, Baitang Town has 19,000 mu of mountain tea, of which Luotang Village has 2,000 mu, accounting for 10% of the town's total mountain tea planting area, making it truly a major tea-growing village. Today, the village's 2,000 mu of tea gardens have an annual output value of as much as 30 million yuan, and the annual per capita tea-growing income exceeds 10,000 yuan. The annual per capita net income of the village's 31 poor households rose from 2,650 yuan before the assistance to 10,085 yuan by the end of last year, achieving the poverty alleviation goal.
Cooperatives provide one-stop production and sales services
The main mountain tea varieties in Luotang Village are small-leaf mountain tea and small-leaf purple bud tea. Gong Xinqiang, the village Party branch secretary and village committee director, told the reporter that the village currently has 3 cooperatives, which, through the "cooperative (enterprise) + base + farmers (collective) + standards" operating model, provide villagers with one-stop services for tea production, processing and sales.
Zhang Jinshui, head of the Baitang Chunxiang Mountain Tea Professional Cooperative, told the reporter that since its establishment, the cooperative has driven 200 farming households to grow mountain tea. "Through unified guidance, unified purchasing and so on, the quality of mountain tea keeps improving, and market prices have risen accordingly."
"We will continue to support Luotang Village in expanding its tea industry and help villagers get rich," said Mei Min, a village-stationed cadre from the Taiwan Affairs Office of the Municipal Party Committee. During the assistance period, the Taiwan Affairs Office of the Municipal Party Committee and Huizhou Motor Transport Group helped Luotang Village improve the construction plan for professional cooperatives, the leading industry development plan and the management system for the use of poverty alleviation funds, guiding farming households to use their own advantages to participate in agricultural industrialization and build a sustainable industrial pattern of "one village, one industry, one village, one product."
It is reported that as of the end of last year, the annual collective economic income of Luotang Village had risen from 26,500 yuan before the assistance to 110,000 yuan; the annual per capita income had risen from 4,638 yuan before the assistance to 11,850 yuan. (Our reporter Yuan Chang)