Black goats raised in an abandoned school, with mountain forest and grassland becoming a fine pasture
Original title: Wang Yanshang's clever village-stationed poverty alleviation measures -
Abandoned school becomes a black goat breeding base
A school abandoned for more than ten years has been successfully transformed into a black goat farm.
A few days ago, during an interview at the goat farm in Tiantou Village, Qishui Town, Leizhou City, the reporter saw that the sheep pens were laid out reasonably, with separate and carefully arranged quarters for males and females, and the entire shed area was well lit and well ventilated. Not far from the sheep shed is Chentie Reservoir, surrounded by about 5,000 mu of mountain forest and grassland, making it a veritable "natural pasture."
But you might not have expected that a year ago this place was still a school abandoned for more than ten years, with a building area of 200 sq m. The two-story school building was still intact, but it had been out of repair for many years, and weeds had already overgrown the campus. At that time, Wang Yanshang, an employee of Guangzhou Communications Investment Group who was carrying out poverty alleviation work in the village, adapted measures to local conditions and brought in the Xinding Breeding Cooperative to develop black goat farming. After renovations such as building walls, repairing sheep pens, digging wells and bringing in electricity, a modern large-scale farm was completed, which can increase the village collective's income by more than 50,000 yuan each year.
Turning the abandoned school into a black goat breeding base is only a microcosm of the village's targeted poverty alleviation practices. The poverty alleviation team also built a small farmers' market over an abandoned drainage ditch and turned a "waste pond" into 300 mu of good farmland. A series of clever poverty alleviation measures have set Tiantou Village on a path of sustainable development toward escaping poverty and becoming prosperous, turning it into a demonstration village of happy and secure living.
Volunteering for the assignment -
Traveling far to Leizhou to be stationed in a village for poverty alleviation
Wang Yanshang, 45 this year, is from Pingdingshan, Henan Province. After being transferred from the military, he worked at Guangzhou Communications Investment Group, starting as an ordinary employee and gradually growing into a highway administration brigade leader.
"I come from the countryside, I understand the countryside, and I am willing to contribute my own strength to helping poor villages escape poverty and become prosperous." In June 2013, at the selection site for village-stationed cadres for poverty alleviation and development of Guangzhou Communications Investment Group, Wang Yanshang spoke these heartfelt words. At the beginning of the new round of poverty alleviation and development work, Wang Yanshang volunteered, hoping to become a glorious "village-stationed poverty alleviation worker." With his strong overall qualities, he ultimately stood out and got his wish. From then on, he came to his new post in poverty alleviation and development.
Tiantou Administrative Village is located in the southern part of Qishui Town and consists of 3 natural villages: Tiantou, Chentie and Chentiexu. The whole village has a total of 595 households and 2,975 people, including 172 poor households with 996 people. The village collective basically has no source of income, and the villagers' per capita annual income is only 3,750 yuan, making the assistance task heavy and the pressure great.
In the "pairing to household" work of poverty alleviation and development, Guangzhou Communications Investment Group is responsible for counterpart assistance to the two villages of Tiantou and Tangtou in Qishui Town, and the pressure to raise assistance funds is very great. "We must maximize the benefits of assistance funds, use good steel on the blade, and accomplish great things with little money." This was the expectation that Pan Shuangming, chairman of the group, had for Wang Yanshang.
Wang Yanshang set up "home" in the office building of the Tiantou Village Committee, and kept everything in his life simple. He rose early and worked late, traveled to every corner of the village, clearly identified the "crux" of poverty, and made sure to "prescribe the right medicine."
For a long time, Wang Yanshang has maintained the style of a soldier: hard-working and swift in action. And his every move also deeply influenced the cadres and masses of Tiantou Village. "As long as it is beneficial to the village's development and helps the masses escape poverty and become prosperous, he does what he says he will do and never wavers." This was Lin Ping's assessment of Wang Yanshang as village party secretary of Tiantou Village.
Solving difficulties and relieving hardship -
Building roads and bridges to safeguard people's livelihood
Because Tiantou Village is remote, its infrastructure is very backward. Wang Yanshang saw it with his own eyes and felt anxious in his heart, and tried every possible way to secure funds to solve problems for the local people.
The southwest exit of Tiantou Village was blocked by a river ditch. Due to economic difficulties, the village could not raise funds to build a bridge, so it could only use a culvert pipe as a substitute. Every rainy season, when the river rose sharply, the culvert pipe drained poorly, causing farmland upstream to be flooded and posing a threat to the travel safety of nearby villagers. Therefore, Wang Yanshang reported to his unit and sought support. Guangzhou Communications Investment Group raised 75,000 yuan and launched the bridge construction project. In October 2014, a small bridge 8 m long and 7 m wide was fully completed. Out of gratitude, the local people named the bridge "Guangjiao Bridge."
In the past, Tiantou Village had only a 2 m wide dirt road leading out of the village. On sunny days, motorcycles could still pass, but on rainy days, people could only travel on foot. Especially during busy farming seasons, fertilizer could not be transported by truck, and large combine harvesters could not enter the village either. This became the development "bottleneck" of Tiantou Village.
"When roads are open, wealth flows. This development 'bottleneck' must be broken!" Wang Yanshang's words were firm and resounding. Through his active efforts, Guangzhou Communications Investment Group invested 480,000 yuan and built 2.5 km of hardened road, connecting the 3 natural villages into one and solving the masses' problem of "difficult travel."
What encouraged Wang Yanshang even more was that after the road construction project got underway, it immediately received a positive response from the masses, and each natural village set off a boom in building lanes. The assisting unit also took the opportunity to continue increasing support funds for road construction. "This project invested more than 1 million yuan in total, of which the assisting unit contributed 850,000 yuan, building 6 km of cement roads. At present, all lanes in the village have been hardened, and the village's appearance has been significantly improved." Lin Ping said joyfully.
In addition, Guangzhou Communications Investment Group invested 320,000 yuan to build a water tower, dig wells, repair a pump house and lay pipe networks, so that all villagers could drink clean and hygienic "reassuring water"; invested 250,000 yuan to renovate the primary school's infrastructure, laying a solid foundation for cultural poverty alleviation; and invested 200,000 yuan to build the Tiantou Village cultural building to enrich the villagers' cultural life.
To help the masses solve practical difficulties, Wang Yanshang also mobilized caring social forces to come and provide assistance. Wang Yanshang's fellow townsman, Zhu Tingxuan, president of the Guangdong Province Henan Pingdingshan Chamber of Commerce and chairman of Guangdong Zhuli Investment Co., Ltd., led Henan entrepreneurs doing business in Guangdong on 3 long journeys here to buy clothes, donate desks and donate cash for the students of Tiantou Primary School, with donated materials totaling 250,000 yuan. They also "paired up" with children from 8 poor families and paid for their schooling expenses.
In addition, caring individuals donated 30,000 yuan to build a cultural and sports square for Tiantou Village and add sports facilities, giving villagers a good place to exercise in their spare time during the slack farming season. Today's Tiantou Village has neat roads, shady green trees and a harmonious village atmosphere, becoming a veritable demonstration village of happy and secure living.
Turning "waste" into treasure -
Stimulating the potential for economic development
How can poverty alleviation funds generate the greatest economic benefits? This was a question Wang Yanshang repeatedly pondered during his village-stationed assistance process.
In order to develop the collective economy, Wang Yanshang and the village cadres planned to build a convenience market based on local realities, so as to solve the village committee's predicament of "zero income." But the Tiantou Village Committee did not even have "a patch of its own land," and the issue of construction land became the "stumbling block" to building the market.
After some investigation, Wang Yanshang found that in front of the village there was a waste water ditch, overgrown with weeds and swarming with flies and mosquitoes, but its location had convenient transportation. He had a flash of inspiration: build the market here, with the foundation elevated on stilts, so that it would neither affect the ditch's drainage function nor fail to clean up the dirty and messy conditions. Would that not kill two birds with one stone?
At the beginning of last year, a convenience market costing 120,000 yuan and with a building area of 65 sq m rose from the ground. Through public bidding, a villager rented the market for 260,000 yuan for 6 years, which could generate an average annual income of 43,000 yuan for the village collective. After the lease term expires, the village committee will continue to contract it out. This move provided the village collective with a stable and sustainable channel for increasing income, and the villagers all applauded.