Li Liangjun's Eco-Agriculture Dream in Xichong, Sichuan

Surrounded by green mountains and clear waters, with cattle and sheep filling the pens, ducks and geese in flocks, clear water and fat fish, and fruits and vegetables filling the garden... This picturesque pastoral scene depicts exactly the landscape of the ecological planting and breeding park in Yujiaya Village, Yixing Town, Xichong County. On January 4, the reporter came to this village and interviewed Li Liangjun, the person in charge of the planting park.

Driving from Xichong county town, after traveling more than 40 km, one arrives at Yujiaya Village. "Welcome, welcome." As soon as the reporter got out of the car, Li Liangjun could be seen waiting at the village entrance from afar. Seeing the reporter and companions arrive, he hurried forward to greet them.

"Look, that is my ecological planting and breeding park." Accompanied by Li Liangjun, the group walked into his ecological planting and breeding park, bathed in the warm sunlight, smelling the fragrance of the soil, and experiencing the quiet and leisurely pastoral life, making one reluctant to leave.

To Realize a Dream, He Resolutely Returned Home to Be a Farmer

On the way, when the reporter asked why he wanted to create original ecological agricultural products, Li Liangjun opened his heart to the reporter. He said this stemmed from his dream of "ecological agriculture."

Previously, he had worked at a state-owned enterprise. After being laid off, he went to coastal cities such as Guangzhou, Shenzhen, and Zhuhai to struggle and make a living. He built roads and bridges, and also worked in real estate. After years of hard work, he finally accumulated substantial capital.

Li Liangjun not only liked reading newspapers and periodicals, but also liked going online. Through the media, he kept up with the latest developments in agriculture in a timely manner and paid attention to valuable agricultural reports. He learned that in rural areas at present, because young people went out to work in large numbers, many left-behind elderly people and left-behind children had been created, and much land had therefore been abandoned; on the other hand, the various food safety problems that kept appearing made him feel deeply distressed.

Until one day, after Li Liangjun learned from the news that Xichong was vigorously developing modern agriculture, the words "modern agricultural ecological planting" deeply touched the dream that had been hidden in his heart for many years.

"Everyone has their own dream. Since childhood, I have longed for pastoral life, but I just never had the courage to try it." Li Liangjun said with a smile that in recent years, food safety had received more and more attention from people, and he developed the idea of going to the countryside to create an "ecological farm." He said that growing agricultural products without any pollution was not only the direction of future agricultural development, but also enough for his dream. For this dream, he resolutely left Shenzhen and returned to Xichong to be a farmer.

Li Liangjun said that in the eyes of many people, this move of his was hard to understand. Unexpectedly, he received his wife's support. With his wife's support, Li Liangjun became even more firm in his determination. In May 2013, he contracted more than 800 mu of land in Yujiaya Village, Yixing Town, and began to move forward step by step toward his dream of ecological agriculture.

To Achieve "Zero Pollution," He Insisted on Using Ecological Methods

As soon as he arrived in Yujiaya Village, the first thing Li Liangjun did was build roads. He spent nearly half a year leveling a 4-meter-wide, 3-km-long road into the village, which not only allowed various mechanical equipment to be brought into the mountain valley, but also brought great convenience to the daily travel of nearby villagers.

"My requirement is that the farm does not spray pesticides and does not apply chemical fertilizers, and every agricultural product grown must be pure original ecological 'zero pollution.'" Li Liangjun said that to make crops truly "zero pollution" was not as simple as it sounded. Aside from the fact that crop seedlings must be safe and pollution-free, there were also strict requirements for the entire planting process and the land used for planting.

"Soil improvement is the first step, and also the most important step." Li Liangjun introduced that, on the advice of agricultural technicians, he first changed the original cultivated land into slope land to facilitate drainage and pollution discharge; then he dug out the polluted topsoil and used the unpolluted subsoil inside for planting; then he spread weeds on the land to nourish the soil.

After the soil was improved, Li Liangjun planted 200 mu of sorghum, 160 mu of wheat, and some corn and rice. To prevent and control diseases and insect pests, he also planted some garlic and Chinese medicinal herbs, using the characteristics of these plants to kill harmful organisms in the soil.

For ease of management, Li Liangjun ate and lived in the park. When he saw weeds growing, he pulled them by hand and cut them with a weed trimmer. When he really could not manage, he asked nearby villagers to pull weeds together. Over the course of a year, the labor cost for weeding alone reached more than 20,000 yuan. Nearby villagers laughed at him, saying it was too unworthy, and that using herbicide was both faster and cheaper. But Li Liangjun shook his head. If he used herbicide, all his hard work would be wasted.

Through his hard work, the stretches of crops in the planting park were growing gratifyingly, and the chicken and duck sheds and pig and sheep pens also became lively. Li Liangjun integrated planting and breeding, truly realizing an ecological cycle. When the rice and corn harvest season came, he invited the villagers to taste them for free. After tasting, the villagers all felt that the taste was different from other rice and corn. Although some villagers also grew rice and corn themselves, they felt that the rice and corn he grew were more delicious, and they even specially bought a lot to take home to eat.

For Diversified Development, Brewing Baijiu and Developing Rural Tourism

"The sorghum produced in the planting park is the best raw material for brewing baijiu." Li Liangjun told the reporter that he planted a large amount of sorghum in the ecological park. Every time the sorghum was harvested, he would select plump, high-quality sorghum grains to brew baijiu.

For brewing wine, spring water is the most critical element. Li Liangjun introduced that next to the distillery there was an old well, anciently named "Liangshui Spring." The reason the spring water of the old well was sweet and refreshing was that the ecological environment here was excellent. The water of Dadeng Mountain, after being filtered level by level through mountain rocks and faults, gathered here. With such excellent water quality, when this spring water was used to make wine, the taste of the wine went without saying.

Li Liangjun introduced that in the first Sichuan Northeast Small and Medium-Sized Baijiu Selection Competition held in Nanchong, the baijiu he brewed stood out among the many contestants and won the gold award. "Winning the award is an encouragement to me, and also an affirmation of what I do. In the future, I will continue to persevere and operate in a diversified way.

A farm naturally focuses mainly on agricultural production, but Li Liangjun was not satisfied with only that. Being in the green mountains and clear waters, he saw the tourism value of the farm. "Yujiaya Village not only has beautiful scenery, but also has a reservoir. I plan to rely on the mountain and water resources to develop tourism projects with special features such as sightseeing vacations and outdoor sports in the ecological farm." When talking about the future, Li Liangjun's face was full of confidence.