Post-90s college student "Rabbit Commander" leads villagers to wealth through rabbit farming

Zhang Sheng and the rabbits he raises

Robust and lively rabbits

**In Benbutu Town, Bohu County, Bayingolin Prefecture, there is a young man born in the 1990s who, after graduating from university and completing an internship, founded a meat rabbit breeding farm. Not only did his business thrive, but he also led villagers to prosperity through both words and example, earning him the respectful title of "Rabbit Commander" from the locals.

On December 17, the reporter came to Group 4 of Mangan Chagan Village, Benbutu Town, Bohu County, and found this professional rabbit farmer to share his entrepreneurial journey and rabbit-raising experience.

Becoming a skilled breeder was a childhood dream

23-year-old Zhang Sheng is tall and quick in his work, yet he is shy when he speaks. From a young age, he loved raising pigeons, cats, dogs and other animals, and his dream was to become an expert in livestock breeding.

In 2011, Zhang Sheng was admitted to **Changji City Agricultural Technical College as he had wished, majoring in animal husbandry and veterinary medicine. After 3 years of study, he entered society. As a fresh graduate with little experience, he applied for jobs several times, but the doors of local breeding enterprises were not open to him.

After several days of thinking, Zhang Sheng took a few classmates to the Zhengbang Pig Farm of the 22nd Regiment of the Second Division of the XPCC near his hometown, planning to gain practical experience through on-site learning combined with theoretical knowledge to accumulate his breeding expertise.

Politely declining an annual salary of 60,000 yuan

The work at the pig farm was dirty and exhausting, with more than ten hours of work every day and the smell of pig manure on him at all times, yet the monthly wage was only 2,400 yuan. The classmates who went with him could not endure the hardship and slipped away after just a few days.

But Zhang Sheng did not think that way. He said, "I came here to learn techniques. No matter how hard or tiring it is, I must persist." He rushed to do the work of transporting feed, feeding pigs and cleaning manure, and working overtime was commonplace. He only went home once every half a year to visit his parents. His parents advised him to change jobs, but Zhang Sheng gritted his teeth and persevered, because he firmly believed that effort would always be rewarded.

The owner of the pig farm saw that this young man was down-to-earth and hardworking, and valued him especially. In less than two months of work, he made Zhang Sheng a team leader responsible for sow breeding. From the birth of piglets to disease prevention and control, he participated in management throughout the whole process. Combined with his love of thinking, he soon mastered the key techniques of pig breeding and epidemic prevention, becoming a versatile hand at the pig farm.

After the one-year internship ended, the pig farm owner promised him an annual salary of 60,000 yuan and offered to hire him as a technician, but Zhang Sheng politely declined.

The rugged entrepreneurial road of rabbit farming

In the winter of 2014, Zhang Sheng surveyed the local market and found that meat rabbit breeding and sales were a huge piece of cake in the Bayingolin Prefecture area, so he discussed building a rabbit farm with his family.

In the spring of 2015, Zhang Sheng mobilized the whole family to raise 200,000 yuan, and also borrowed 200,000 yuan from the Bohu County Rural Commercial Bank, built a 500 sq m rabbit house, and bought 300 breeding rabbits, thus embarking on the entrepreneurial road.

The road of life is not flat everywhere, and the road of rabbit farming is likewise rugged and uneven.

In June 2015, when the female rabbits gave birth to their first litter of baby rabbits, many people came to visit the rabbit farm after hearing the news, and the female rabbits were startled, causing more than a dozen female rabbits to miscarry, resulting in no small loss.

The first batch of newborn baby rabbits began artificial feeding one month later. Due to lack of experience, Zhang Sheng had problems with the baby rabbits' feed.

Seeing the baby rabbits he was raising die in large numbers from illness made Zhang Sheng very sad, and he resolved to overcome the problem of disease prevention in meat rabbits.

So Zhang Sheng began to buy rabbit-raising books to study on his own, and at the same time consulted the technical guidance of Heilongjiang Longquan Rabbit Industry through the internet, and also established a long-term support relationship with Longquan Rabbit Industry.

In order to understand the growth habits of the baby rabbits, Zhang Sheng lived in the rabbit house, starting from the patterns of the baby rabbits' diet and activity, and did a good job preventing common rabbit diseases. Seeing the rabbits he carefully managed grow up, Zhang Sheng was so happy he could not close his mouth.

Leading villagers to open the door to wealth with "rabbit babies"

Through study and exploration, Zhang Sheng gradually mastered meat rabbit breeding and epidemic prevention techniques, and his rabbit farming business also gradually expanded. By the end of 2015, he had sold more than 1,300 meat rabbits and had 2,600 on hand. Calculated at the market price of 18 yuan per kilogram of meat rabbit, the net income from rabbit meat alone was more than 30,000 yuan.

Seeing that Zhang Sheng's meat rabbit farming was quite profitable, local farmers came in an endless stream to visit and learn. Now, several farmers in **Bohu County, Hejing County, Hoxud County and other places have already ordered several hundred breeding rabbits from him, which will be a considerable income.

"Only after the people around me see with their own eyes that I have made money raising rabbits will they cooperate with me. I will also teach them breeding techniques and lead everyone to prosperity together. They now call me 'Rabbit Commander'." Zhang Sheng's pride was evident in his words.

Talking about his future plans, Zhang Sheng told the reporter, "I plan to recover my capital in 3 years, then expand the breeding scale. My wish is to build a one-stop rabbit farming industry chain of meat rabbit breeding, slaughtering and frozen processing, and become the largest meat rabbit breeding enterprise in the Bohu area. Let more people make 'rabbit' money with me."