Changli honey pears face sales difficulties, lacking the brand-building step
Original title: Deputies offer advice on the difficulty of selling agricultural products
Changli honey pears (online image)
At noon on March 4, the Beijing delegation to the National People's Congress had just returned to its lodging after the preparatory meeting when Liu Xincheng, a deputy to the National People's Congress and president of the Beijing Institute of Socialism, called over Feng Leping, also a deputy to the National People's Congress and president of the Beijing Farmers' Professional Cooperative Federation, and Gao Lipu, a researcher at the Vegetable Research Center of the Beijing Academy of Agriculture and Forestry Sciences. The reason he called over the two "agriculture-related" deputies was that he wanted to ask a question on behalf of a farmer friend.
On the eve of this year's "Two Sessions," Liu Xincheng received a phone call from a farmer in Changli County, Hebei Province, who told him that last year his family's 60 mu of Changli honey pears had a bumper harvest, but with spring approaching, sales were still a problem. It was not just his family; many pear farmers in Changli County were also facing the problem of unsold pears. "Difficulty in selling agricultural products appears almost every year. Is there any solution?"
Feng Leping said that for the sale of specialty agricultural products, the key still lies in establishing one's own brand. Only by building a solid foundation of excellent quality and gaining market recognition can a brand that holds up in the market be formed. Once the brand is well known and order-based sales are carried out, and the path of determining production by sales is smoothed out, the problem of unsold products can be avoided as much as possible.
During her research while performing her duties, Gao Lipu found that direct express channels for agricultural products are an effective way to reduce intermediate links and lower the sales costs of agricultural products. "Adopting the method of direct procurement at the place of origin and direct supply to communities can, to a certain extent, effectively solve the sales difficulties of small-batch agricultural products. But to solve the problem sustainably and ensure farmers' income growth, it is still necessary to develop products in multiple product forms, develop functional products, extend the industrial chain, extend the market period of agricultural products, and increase added value. This is the key to solving the difficulty of selling agricultural products."
Feng Leping added that in the process of upgrading agricultural industrialization, all links in the agricultural industry should gradually form a pattern of letting professional people do professional things. Farmers should learn to use market marketing entities to help themselves with brand building and product sales, and then focus on production and win the market with quality. (Reporter Guo Shaoya for this newspaper)