Cattle Farming Startup: Zhang Hangyin and Her Husband Quit Their Jobs to Return to Their Hometown as Cattle Bosses
These past few days, Zhang Hangyin has been tending cattle at her own cattle farm, getting ready to load them up and ship them out as soon as orders come in. Two years ago, Zhang Hangyin took out all her savings to return to her hometown and start a cattle farming business. Recalling every step of the journey, Zhang Hangyin was filled with emotion: "Only I know the bittersweet moments of starting a business. Getting to this point has been far from easy."
After two years of development, Zhang Hangyin has already established a dedicated agricultural development company, with an annual slaughter volume reaching 500 head. She has led 83 surrounding farming households to get rich by raising cattle, and helped 43 impoverished households get rich by raising cattle, becoming a widely known leader in wealth creation in the area.
A tough woman who quit her job after graduating from university to return to her hometown and start a cattle farming business, building the South Sichuan Beef Cattle Trading Market
In 2011, Zhang Hangyin, fresh out of university, found a job at Foxconn doing cost budgeting and other management work. After more than a year on the job, Zhang Hangyin had not found joy or meaning in her work.
After discussing with her husband Luo Bin, in 2012, Zhang Hangyin and Luo Bin quit their jobs and returned to their hometown, deciding to start with raising beef cattle. Starting from just over 20 head of beef cattle in 2012, Zhang Hangyin experienced the hardships and difficulties of entrepreneurship.
"In those early years, I had to do everything myself - scouting the market, negotiating sales, buying feed, cutting grass, hauling things, giving injections - it was very tough. But thinking about our goals, we never gave up." Zhang Hangyin told reporters.
Although they encountered many difficulties during the startup process, through the couple's efforts and more than a year of exploration, they not only mastered cattle farming techniques and cattle trading channels, but also overcame the challenge of stress management for long-distance beef cattle transport. In early 2014, Zhang Hangyin and her husband funded the establishment of Xiangyang Agricultural Development Co., Ltd., specializing in beef cattle farming.
To help more cattle farmers reduce transaction steps, lower farmers' costs of buying cattle, and enable more mountain-area farmers to get rich and reach moderate prosperity through cattle farming, she took out all the family's savings and in January 2014 successfully registered Junlian County Xiangyang Agricultural Development Co., Ltd., and invested in building the first standardized beef cattle trading market in South Sichuan, allowing the vast number of farmer-breeders to buy good cattle, ending the situation where cattle dealers "ruled supreme," and giving profits back to the breeders. Fatten cattle well, sell at a good price.
In September 2014, the South Sichuan Beef Cattle Trading Market invested in by the company officially opened. The construction of the trading market improved the beef cattle industry chain of Yibin City, facilitated beef cattle trading in the Yunnan-Guizhou-Sichuan border region, filled the gap of no beef cattle trading market in Junlian and even the South Sichuan region, and provided a convenient and fair trading platform for numerous cattle farmers.
According to reports, the South Sichuan Beef Cattle Trading Market took only 4 months from preparation to opening. After completion, it reduced transaction steps, increased profits, and attracted numerous beef cattle traders and breeders from the Yunnan-Guizhou-Sichuan region to come for business negotiations.
Benefiting the Hometown and Driving Surrounding Residents to Get Rich and Increase Income
After the company was established, Zhang Hangyin adhered to a market-oriented approach, with technology as support, poverty alleviation as the purpose, and efficiency for survival, promoting the healthy development of beef cattle farming. She adopted methods of dispersed breeding, unified management, centralized fattening, batch sales, and technical services, sharing benefits among all shareholders, with risks mainly borne by the company, giving profits back to ordinary breeders.
After two years of continuous development, the company currently covers a building area of 50 mu, has 16 employees, an annual slaughter volume of 500 commercial beef cattle, and leads 83 surrounding farming households to get rich by raising cattle. The beef cattle are sold far and wide to Sichuan, Yunnan, Guangzhou, Chongqing, Shanghai and other places. At the same time, it has 1 trading service center building, 1 electronic trading hall, over 1000 sq m of office space, and a trading market with eight major functional zones including a trading area, a consignment breeding area, and a management area. It is the first standardized beef cattle trading market in the combined region of South Sichuan, Northeast Yunnan, and Northwest Guizhou.
Zhang Hangyin stated: Currently we are implementing a traditional + online model for marketing, practicing physical trading + electronic trading, gradually introducing auction trading and futures trading, and building a beef cattle exchange community "Dr. Cattle Community" and a mid-to-high-end live cattle trading website. The short-term goal is to drive 43 impoverished households in Hongqi Village to raise 200 head of beef cattle, and non-impoverished households to raise 300 head of beef cattle, for a total of 500 head of beef cattle, helping all 43 registered impoverished households achieve the goal of poverty alleviation and overcoming difficulties by 2019.
As a university student entrepreneur, Zhang Hangyin deeply understands the bittersweet moments involved. She hopes to attract more university students to serve rural areas and change rural areas, so in 2014 the company applied to establish the Junlian County Youth Entrepreneurship and Employment Demonstration Base, providing a large number of internship and trainee positions for university students interested in pursuing the breeding industry.
Over the past few years, Zhang Hangyin has successively received a large number of honorary titles, including the Bronze Award in the National College Student Practice Challenge of "Chuang Qingchun," the Gold Award in the Sichuan Provincial College Student Innovation and Entrepreneurship Competition of "Chuang Qingchun," the "Tianfu Youth Entrepreneurship Award" in the Sichuan Provincial Youth Innovation, Entrepreneurship and Wealth Creation Competition, and the Top Ten Entrepreneurship Golden Ideas Project of Yibin City (while also being appointed as a Youth Entrepreneurship Mentor of Yibin City).