Medicinal herb cultivation made him a leader in becoming wealthy

Xu Zuoxiong is the chairman of the Chushankuo Medicinal Herb Planting Professional Cooperative in Sangzhi County. He is a returning migrant worker from Lijiaya Village, Qiaozhiwan Township, Sangzhi County, a plain and honest mountain man with no grand boasts. His harsh living environment tempered his strong and resolute character. Because he is hardworking and proactive, he led the villagers to dig a “golden doll” out of the barren land, becoming a leader in becoming wealthy through medicinal herb cultivation. 

A mindful person good at seizing business opportunities 

In 1976, Xu Zuoxiong was born in Lijiaya Village, Qiaozhiwan Township, Sangzhi County. In 1995, Xu Zuoxiong graduated from high school. Having failed the college entrance examination, he originally could have repeated a year and gotten into university, but misfortune struck unexpectedly: in 1994, his father, the family's pillar, passed away, and his mother was over sixty. Xu Zuoxiong felt sorry for his mother and could not bear to let her toil. In 1996, Xu Zuoxiong packed his bags and went far away to Shenzhen to work, and this lasted 14 years. In 2008, 32-year-old Xu Zuoxiong met and fell in love with Li Aiguo, a woman from his hometown who had already been working away from home for 11 years, and they formed a family. Soon after marriage, they had their first child. The couple worked away from home, so they had to leave their two- or three-year-old child with his nearly eighty-year-old mother. They could not bear it in their hearts and felt uneasy. After much thought, the couple made the painful decision to return to their hometown to start a business. In 2010, the couple returned to Lijiaya Village, Qiaozhiwan Township, building a house while looking for a path to prosperity and a moderately prosperous life, and this search lasted three years. 

Xu Zuoxiong is a mindful person and also a cautious person. More than 10 years of migrant work had honed his keen sense for business opportunities. After investigating market conditions and going deep into the homes of medicinal herb growers in the county to learn about the cultivation and sales of medicinal herbs, he found that the profit margin in medicinal herb cultivation was considerable. Once things were settled, he acted at once. In early 2013, Xu Zuoxiong began his arduous entrepreneurship. He transferred 5.8 mu of villagers' land, plus his own 1.2 mu, for a total of 7 mu of land, and began his dream of making money from the land and reaching moderate prosperity. He first invested 6,000 yuan to try growing Angelica dahurica. At first the seedlings were a lovely fresh green, but after two months the seedlings all died, and the 6,000 yuan was gone. 

Xu Zuoxiong did not want others to laugh at him, so he invested another 4,000 yuan to switch to planting Isatis indigotica. For the same reason, at a different time, the seedlings grew well at first, but after a month the soil was poor and the seedlings withered again. His wife Li Aiguo would not stand for it. The money for starting the business was all hard-earned savings the couple had made working away from home. Seeing her husband throwing money into the land, his wife wanted to go out to work. Xu Zuoxiong did not agree, and the couple had a disagreement and began a cold war. After his first cultivation failure, Xu Zuoxiong carefully analyzed the reasons and reached a conclusion: his planting time was wrong and he lacked experience. 

A persistent person who bravely forges a new path 

Shi Wanxiang of the Wanxiang Medicinal Herb Farmers' Professional Cooperative in Sangzhi County was regarded by Xu Zuoxiong as an entrepreneurial “idol.” Shi Wanxiang relied on cultivating and dealing in medicinal herbs to send two children to university and also bought a house in Changsha for his children. The “idol's” story inspired Xu Zuoxiong. So he found Shi Wanxiang and humbly learned from him the technical experience of cultivating and dealing in medicinal herbs. In the second half of 2013, Xu Zuoxiong persuaded his wife, transferred another 10 mu of villagers' land, planted 17 mu of Polygonatum odoratum, and raised 8 mu of Arisaema seedlings and Atractylodes macrocephala seedlings. Hard work will eventually be rewarded. Over half a year, Xu Zuoxiong sold some seedlings and earned 120,000 yuan. 

The news that a “golden doll” had been dug out of the land spread through the whole village at once, and the villagers began to look at Xu Zuoxiong with new eyes. Most young people in the village went out to work, leaving behind only women, children, and the elderly, and much land lay idle. So Xu Zuoxiong transferred 100 mu of land from 40 households at 300 yuan per mu per year, planting 30 mu of Chaenomeles, 14 mu of Polygonatum odoratum, 35 mu of Atractylodes macrocephala, 12 mu of Rheum officinale, and 8 mu of Arisaema. Most of these medicinal herbs yielded returns within one to two years. Polygonatum odoratum brought a net income of 10,000 yuan per mu, Atractylodes macrocephala 4,000 yuan per mu, Rheum officinale 4,000 yuan per mu, Arisaema 5,000 yuan per mu, and Chaenomeles began yielding returns after 3 years of planting, with an annual income of more than 8,000 yuan per mu at current market prices. Xu Zuoxiong had touched the dream of moderate prosperity in the land. 

In order to build his own brand, Xu Zuoxiong founded the Chushankuo Medicinal Herb Professional Cooperative in Sangzhi County in August 2014. In January 2015, Xu Zuoxiong also founded the Shanyise Family Farm in Sangzhi County, opening a new path focused on cultivating medicinal herbs, supplemented by intercropping and relay intercropping of medicinal vegetables, medicinal fruits, and medicinal grains in the herb fields. 

A promising person who gives back to his neighbors 

Having had a first taste of the sweetness of entrepreneurship, Xu Zuoxiong was not satisfied with merely being wealthy himself. That being wealthy alone does not count as being wealthy, and that he must lead the masses onto the road to prosperity together, had always been a dream lingering in Xu Zuoxiong's heart. “Planting corn and grain in the land really cannot compare with planting medicinal herbs. If ordinary people want to dig gold out of the soil, they still have to plant crops with better returns.” Xu Zuoxiong leased the village's idle land and also hired villagers staying at home in the village to help him cultivate medicinal herbs on their own land. For Xu Zuoxiong's 100 mu of medicinal herbs, the wages he paid each year just to the hired villagers reached 200,000 yuan. Now, many elderly people and women staying at home in the village are employed at their doorsteps, have things to do, and earn money. 

Xu Zuoxiong's founding of the Shanyise Family Farm received an active response from village party secretary Xiang Guilin. Together with Xu Zuoxiong, he planted 50 mu of medicinal herbs. In 2014, just 15 mu of Atractylodes macrocephala brought an income of 50,000 yuan, and in 2015 it could reach 100,000 yuan. Under Xu Zuoxiong's drive and influence, 11 households in the whole village planted medicinal herbs, the least 3 mu and the most 14 mu. Those who did not plant medicinal herbs brought their land to work in Xu Zuoxiong's medicinal herb fields. 

Xu Zuoxiong, already a probationary member of the Communist Party of China, has a big dream of moderate prosperity. He wants to work with the villagers to turn Lijiaya Village into a specialized village with 2,000 mu of medicinal herb cultivation, then build a rough processing factory for medicinal herbs, forming a full-chain medicinal herb industry integrating production, supply, and sales. By then, the young people in the village will all work on their own land and be employed at their doorsteps. 

Now, without anyone realizing it, the whole village has developed more than 500 mu of medicinal herbs. As farmers continue to join in, the plan is that by 2020 the whole village will develop 2,000 mu of medicinal herbs. Xu Zuoxiong is gradually realizing his dream of moderate prosperity on the land.