Free-range chicken farming set him on the road to prosperity
"Cluck, cluck, cluck..." At the sound of their owner's clear call, the free-range chickens that had slept soundly all night came rushing out of their coop, cackling nonstop in front of the feed bucket and jostling for highland barley... This was the scene a reporter witnessed on April 23 in the backyard of Zhang Longtao, a resident of Rangke Town, Rangtang County.
With little arable land and harsh climatic conditions, Zhang Longtao's whole family had long barely scraped by growing highland barley and potatoes. "Crop yields are relatively low, and the grain we grow is basically only enough to feed the family and the livestock, with nothing extra to sell for money, so life has always been very poor."
His path to prosperity began with a chance occurrence. Once, he saw a television report about getting rich by raising free-range chickens, and from then on a "chicken-farming dream" took root in Zhang Longtao's heart. The plateau has good ecological conditions, and the free-range chickens raised there are of high quality, so why not use these advantages to develop a free-range chicken farming business? So he and his family began renovating the coop and buying chicks... Zhang Longtao set off on the road of free-range chicken farming.
Everything is hard at the beginning, and Zhang Longtao ran into difficulties as soon as he started raising free-range chickens. A series of unexpected problems confronted him: the chicks struggled to adapt to the environment, fell ill frequently, and feed was in short supply. To better understand the habits of free-range chickens, Zhang Longtao went everywhere to learn farming techniques.
After consulting livestock experts many times and visiting nearby farming households to learn, Zhang Longtao accumulated a set of free-range chicken "farming know-how" suited to the Rangtang plateau. Now, through his careful preparations, his plateau chicken-farming dream has finally become a reality within reach. Four chicken coops and more than 300 ecological chickens: the backyard that once stored odds and ends has become Zhang Longtao's "industrial base."
"The laying hens we raise are not fed any industrial feed; we use an ecological free-range method, and the eggs we produce sell for about twice the unit price of ordinary eggs." Speaking of his family's free-range chickens, Zhang Longtao's face lit up with joy. "I never even dreamed that we could raise free-range chickens on the plateau. Thanks to the country's series of good policies benefiting farmers, a cooperative was set up to strongly support us. I'm truly grateful!"
Rangke Town, taking into account its small arable area but its location right next to the county seat, this "big market," established the "Jiwang Laying Hen Professional Breeding Cooperative" tailored to local conditions, preparing to produce green ecological eggs that could be the "undisputed champion" of the egg industry.
"Our cooperative currently has 20 people and has raised more than 200,000 yuan in funds. We have to firmly bind ourselves into one rope to grow bigger and stronger and develop together." Zhang Longtao told the reporter that under the careful guidance of the county's livestock experts, the chicks introduced by the cooperative are currently growing very well, and are expected to start laying eggs for sale in 3 months.
News link: In recent years, Rangke Town, focusing on increasing residents' incomes, has actively encouraged and guided the establishment of specialized cooperative economic organizations in line with the approach of "adapting to local conditions, diversified founding, government guidance, departmental direction, and market operation." Up to now, the whole town has 3 farmers' professional cooperatives, namely the Sunshine Vegetable Professional Cooperative, the Laying Hen Breeding Professional Cooperative, and the Aba Chinese Bee Breeding Professional Cooperative, and has established Hongjing Transport Co., Ltd. (agricultural product distribution), with more than 50 members in total and an expected per capita annual income increase of more than 40,000 yuan.