The Wealth-Building Story of a Strong Woman Deep in the Mountains of Dingxi, Gansu

Since late July 2015, rainfall in most parts of Dingxi has been the lowest in recorded history, with Anding, Tongwei, Weiyuan and Minxian breaking the record for the least precipitation in the same period over the past 55 years, causing a massive reduction in potato yields in Anding District, one of China's three major potato-producing regions. Yet the potatoes grown on the land leased by Qiang Caixia, head of the Lyping Agricultural Products Purchase and Sale Farmers' Cooperative in Shiquan Township, still had a bumper harvest.

　　A

In a Drought Year, the "Stubborn One's" Potatoes Still Had a Bumper Harvest

On January 4, with only a little over a week to go before this year's twelfth lunar month began. On the village road of Lyping Village, Shiquan Township, Anding District, people who had gone out to work were returning one after another, gathering in twos and threes to chat about their income away from home this year and the harvest in the fields this year.

The same loess soil, the same drought year, yet the "Stubborn One's" potatoes had a bumper harvest, so many they filled the ground. The "Stubborn One" the villagers spoke of was Qiang Caixia, head of the Lyping Agricultural Products Purchase and Sale Farmers' Cooperative.

Qiang Caixia said: "From planting to harvesting, including spraying pesticides in the fields, everything uses mechanized operations throughout. For planting we use black film mulching, for seed potatoes we use virus-free Xindaping, and in the fields we apply potato-specific fertilizer, plus our farmyard manure."

"Farmyard manure both preserves soil moisture and enriches the soil, resists compaction, and its effect is even more obvious in a severe drought year." Speaking of why her own potatoes could have a bumper harvest, Qiang Caixia was simply full of knowledge.

　　B

Even After the Cooperative Lost Money, She Still Paid Out the Members' Dividends

What Qiang Caixia remembers most clearly is that she once sold alfalfa seeds, 4 jiao per jin, 10 jin for 4 yuan, and at the small shop she bought 1 jin of salt, 1 jin of kerosene and 1 set of Spring Festival couplets to get through a simple New Year for a poor family.

"I borrowed 10 yuan from someone else, sold candied hawthorn skewers in Dingxi city, and used the 200 yuan in cash I earned to take over the small shop at the entrance to my old home. During the day I ran the small shop, and at night I went into the city to haul back some fresh vegetables, then sold them the next day." Every potato-digging season, she drove a three-wheeler from village to village buying potatoes and selling them at the Dingxi potato market. Having honed a resolute character since childhood, she set foot on the path of trading agricultural products from then on. Starting from borrowing 10 yuan, she grew to planting income of around 300,000 yuan and agricultural product purchasing income of 100,000 yuan in recent years; her vehicle changed from an agricultural three-wheeler to a large truck.

Relying on the popularity she built up running the small shop and the information she learned from watching TV, in 2010 Qiang Caixia tried to establish a cooperative, buying agricultural products from cooperative members at a price 5 fen higher, and providing members with credit sales of fertilizer, pesticides and other agricultural products and daily necessities.

"Back then I didn't even know what a cooperative was for, I only knew I wanted to do some good for ordinary people, so everyone could pull together and go out into the world to start a business." When Qiang Caixia first set up the cooperative, even her husband Shao Quanhe, relatives and neighbors were opposed, but in the end no one could sway her, and by sheer force of her "stubborn temper" she successfully "persuaded" 104 households of villagers to join her cooperative.

That year, potato purchase prices kept rising, from 0.85 yuan per jin at the start to 1.20 yuan. However, no one expected that before long the selling price of potatoes in the end market would fall, almost a different price every day, falling every day, and most traders did business at a loss. Qiang Caixia also took a heavy loss; when the price fell to 0.75 yuan/jin, she lost 150,000 yuan.

"A gentleman's word is his bond. I promised the members a year-end dividend of 100 yuan each, and I must honor it. I will never let the members suffer a loss!" That year, Qiang Caixia paid out more than 10,000 yuan in dividends to the members, and built a potato storage facility with a capacity of ten million tons.

　　C

Using E-commerce Platforms to Lead the People onto the Road to Prosperity

Today, Qiang Caixia's cooperative has newly built a 300 sq m steel-frame vehicle shed, driven the cultivation of 6 large growing households, formed 6 specialized agricultural machinery service teams, created a new agricultural machinery service model for deep-mountain agricultural production of "cooperative plus family farm linked to farming households," solved the rural development problems of "where do people go, who will farm the land, where does the money come from," and innovated a new model of the agricultural socialized service system in deep mountain areas.

Qiang Caixia allocated the land suitable for mechanized farming to 5 members of the cooperative, each receiving 200 mu of land, becoming large households supported by the cooperative, while she herself planted 700 mu. "The cooperative drives the large growing households, and the large growing households in turn drive the smaller ones, so the problem of abandoned land with no one to farm it is completely solved." Qiang Caixia always has a way.

While interviewing in the cooperative office, phone calls from clients seeking business came one after another, either to discuss selling potatoes or to seek to buy minor grains such as sweet buckwheat and black beans, and she patiently answered every client.

Today, micro e-commerce is a new trend, a new business format and a new engine. Qiang Caixia also keeps up with the times, having set up an e-commerce platform in the cooperative, with local native honey, bitter buckwheat flour, sweet buckwheat flour, lentil flour, naked oat flour, black beans and various other local specialties neatly arranged on the shelves. As for how to make good use of the e-commerce platform to sell local agricultural products, Qiang Caixia has new plans; she is determined to widely open up sources of goods, make many friends, make good use of traditional sales, do a good job in e-commerce sales, build a brand, and let "Lyping" products become popular across the country.