A farmer's diary filled with the secrets to prosperity

Jin Shuling's grape greenhouse.

Jin Shuling's grape-growing diary.

"Other people's grapevines haven't even dropped their leaves yet, but her grape seedlings have already passed dormancy and she's started closing up the greenhouse; other people's grapes aren't ripe yet, but hers have long since hit the market. Don't underestimate those few days of being early - a single greenhouse of grapes can bring in two or three thousand yuan more than ours..." Recently, a reporter walked into QianshawanZhuang Village in Baishahe Subdistrict, and when the conversation turned to the village's grape grower Jin Shuling, the villagers gave a thumbs-up from the bottom of their hearts. By keeping a growing diary, Jin Shuling not only increased her own yields and income, but also led more than 200 farming households in the village onto the road to prosperity.

Writing a growing diary every evening

Jin Shuling, 39 this year, is a farmer's wife through and through. "Ever since I started growing strawberries in greenhouses in 2011, I've developed an unshakeable habit. Every night before bed, I have to pick up the diary on my bedside table and write down everything I did that day and everything I need to do tomorrow, one by one," Jin Shuling said.

Speaking of the habit she has kept up for more than four years, Jin Shuling brought out a stack of diaries from her home. The reporter opened a few of them and took a look; each diary recorded in detail her greenhouse's growing scale, variety layout, prices of farm supplies, use of farm supplies, product prices and income for each year. "When I first started keeping the diary, I didn't record this much each day. Later, little by little, the content grew richer, so I began trying to sum up and sort through it all, writing everything related into the diary," Jin Shuling explained. "And later still, I added solar terms and farming tasks, major floods and droughts, pest and disease control, newly introduced varieties, greenhouse growing income and plans for the next step into the notebook as well." Jin Shuling said that in recent years, by keeping a growing diary and constantly summing up the experience and lessons of vegetable growing, she has not only improved her growing skills, but also strengthened her awareness of science and technology and of costs, maximizing the production efficiency of her greenhouse farming.

Leading the surrounding villagers to prosperity

Many of the big farming households sing Jin Shuling's diary's praises without end. "Don't be fooled by the fact that Jin Shuling only finished middle school - by day she's a farmer working in the fields, but by night, putting pen to paper, she's the scholar of our village," said one villager from QianshawanZhuang Village. "It's precisely because of this scholar Jin Shuling that her family's grapes bring in an average net income of more than 5,000 yuan per mu more than anyone else's every year." The villager said that at first everyone laughed at her for writing a diary every day, but now all the men and women of the village admire her from the bottom of their hearts.

Seeing the increased yields and income from Jin Shuling's greenhouse crops, the villagers admired her and at the same time were moved to learn how to get rich, flocking to her for advice on growing and management experience. Spurred on by her, the surrounding villagers also began to learn about and use science and technology, and the greenhouse area in the surrounding villages gradually grew to more than 500 mu, leading more than 200 farming households onto the road to prosperity.

Making the diary a "golden key" to higher income

During the interview, Jin Shuling told the reporter that after keeping the diary for these past few years, she has mainly three insights. "First, keeping a diary is really about tracking, recording and analyzing the growth process of the crops. Over time, you can develop a production method that better fits the actual situation and keep raising economic returns," Jin Shuling said. "Second, in our daily production we inevitably run into all kinds of problems; recording these in the diary not only makes it easier to consult experts, but also gives us something to refer back to when we run into similar problems later." Jin Shuling said that her third, deeper insight is that keeping a diary can speed up the adjustment of the industrial structure and the spread and application of agricultural science and technology.

Jin Shuling said that diligence makes up for a lack of natural ability; although she isn't highly educated, through these past few years of exploration she has gradually worked out a fairly practical set of methods for greenhouse growing and management. "I will keep writing my growing diary as always," Jin Shuling said. "I believe that as long as I keep being a grower who pays attention, I'll definitely be able to keep increasing my income, and by then, these diaries of mine will truly become the 'golden key' to our family's prosperity."