Li Baoguo spent 34 years turning barren mountains into mountains of wealth

Li Baoguo, a professor at Hebei Agricultural University, has been rooted in the Taihang Mountains for 34 years. His research on barren mountain management technology succeeded, but he said that simply being able to grow trees on the barren mountains was not enough; he also wanted to make the people in the mountainous area prosperous.

This is an apple packaging workshop in Neiqiu County, Hebei. These apples each weigh about one jin, and they are all sold by the piece. Each apple also has a QR code attached; scan it and you can find that they all come from Gangdi Village. But in the past, the apples of Gangdi Village were not worth anything at all. Twenty years ago, when Li Baoguo first came to Gangdi Village, the villagers brought out the best apples in the village to entertain him.

Li Baoguo, professor and doctoral supervisor at Hebei Agricultural University: "They also said we produce apples here too, and they're quite tasty. I said, these lousy apples, all dark and covered with a layer of soot, one look is enough, who would still eat them?"

From that time on, Li Baoguo began using his barren mountain management technology to transform the barren mountains of Gangdi Village. After the transformation was completed, apple trees were planted throughout. Li Baoguo also took out 50,000 yuan himself to buy paper bags and taught the villagers hand by hand to put the paper bags over the apples. When autumn came, the villagers removed the paper bags and found that the apples were indeed larger than before, but their color was white.

Wang Qunshu, a villager from Gangdi Village, Neiqiu County, Xingtai City, Hebei: "Li Baoguo is making a mess here, getting these people all worked up. Look at this apple, what is this, all whitish, who would want it? He said don't worry, in ten days, but in fact after seven days they colored up."

That year, all the bagged apples were bright red, large, and good in taste, and the best ones sold for 50 yuan each.

From pruning, fertilizing, and bagging of apple trees, Li Baoguo created 128 production and management procedures that were easy for villagers to understand, so that the villagers could produce apples just as workers produce standard parts. Today, in Gangdi Village, apples alone bring an annual per capita income of 29,000 yuan.

Over 34 years, Li Baoguo promoted 36 standardized technologies in the Taihang Mountains, with a total demonstration and promotion area of 10.8 million mu of orchards and forests.