Even in a wheelchair, she is determined to fulfill farmers' dream of prosperity

Li Xiaomei (front) inspecting the growth of potatoes.

In Weiyuan County, Gansu, known as the "Hometown of Fine Potato Seed Varieties in China," Li Xiaomei is a household name. This is not only because she is a "big boss" in a wheelchair; when people speak of her, their words carry more respect, because her enterprise is connected to thousands of households.

In 2002, Li Xiaomei took out all the savings she had accumulated from running a clinic earlier, raised 150,000 yuan, and bought an abandoned food processing factory locally. In this old factory area, she built 3 plastic greenhouses and began trial cultivation of Gastrodia elata. In the eyes of others, Li Xiaomei, who "loves to tinker and loves to study things deeply," ran a clinic while also growing medicinal herbs. A few years later, factory buildings and warehouses were gradually built.

With her keen foresight, Li Xiaomei was not satisfied with the success before her. Centering on her medicinal herb base, she led more than 200 farming households in several nearby villages to grow Gastrodia elata as well as local traditional Chinese medicinal herbs such as codonopsis (Codonopsis pilosula) and astragalus (Astragalus membranaceus), forming a small-scale planting base and establishing a Gastrodia elata association. Under Li Xiaomei's influence, the people of Huichuan Town planted Chinese medicinal herbs one after another, and the medicinal herb planting area grew from the original 3,000 mu to 6,000 mu. Medicinal herbs alone brought farmers an annual economic benefit of more than 50 million yuan.

Just as business was getting better and better, in 2008 a sudden car accident struck Li Xiaomei, injuring both her legs so that she could not stand. But Li Xiaomei, naturally strong-willed, did not lose heart and become discouraged. Like a plum blossom that braves the snow, she was unwilling to accept the arrangements of fate.

The car accident left Li Xiaomei in a wheelchair, but she was still a strong person running inside, "I will not admit defeat. I still want to do better, so that more people can benefit."

Afterward, Li Xiaomei raised more than 2 million yuan to register and establish a potato fine seed cooperative. In 2011, in Xincheng Village, Huichuan Town, she built 100 solar greenhouses for potato seedling cultivation, 2 potato storage cellars with a capacity of 1,500 tons, and one 1,000 sq m controlled-atmosphere warehouse. In 2012, she invested another 27 million yuan to build a 23,000 sq m intelligent multi-span greenhouse, and built 2,500 mu of high-quality potato foundation seed breeding bases and 5,000 mu of fine seed breeding production bases in Huichuan Town, Wuzhu Town and other places, with an annual output of 80 million virus-free tissue-cultured plantlets, 120 million foundation seed tubers, 5,000 tons of potato foundation seeds, and about 10,000 tons of fine seeds.

At present, although Gansu Tiandi Agricultural Science and Technology Company has only 68 employees, it has 1,200 cooperative member households. In line with the cooperative principle of "run by the people, managed by the people, and benefited from by the people," Li Xiaomei and her Gansu Tiandi Agricultural Science and Technology Company organize and drive the county's people to carry out propagation of potato foundation seeds and first-grade fine seeds through a management approach of unified seed supply, unified management, unified purchasing, unified storage, and unified sales. Adopting the model of "company (cooperative) leads members, members lead farming households," the company signs orders with cooperative members and farming households, and the company provides potato seeds free of charge to members and contracted farming households, benefiting more than 2,500 local farming households each year, with average household income increasing by more than 5,000 yuan. Through the standardized, specialized and standardized development path of "cooperative + base + farming households," Weiyuan County's fine potato seeds are continuously shipped to all parts of the country.

"This year there are 6,000 mu of potato foundation seed and 2,500 mu of first-grade seed bases, mainly sold to major potato-growing provinces such as Guizhou, Inner Mongolia, and **. Last year the company's output value reached 50 million yuan." Li Xiaomei told reporters that she not only drives farming households to grow fine potato seeds, but also meets a large local demand for farm labor. "In our own bases alone, more than 10,000 person-times of labor are hired each year."

Wang Yongshou and his wife from Nangou Village, Huichuan Town, have worked year-round at Li Xiaomei's fine potato seed base, while also growing 10 mu of potato foundation seed themselves. "The two of us can earn about 70,000 to 80,000 yuan a year at Tiandi Company. When there is a lot of work on our own land, we ask the boss for leave and go back to work." Wang Yongshou's words were full of gratitude. "My own 10 mu of land can also bring in more than 40,000 yuan a year. This total income of more than 100,000 yuan a year all depends on Li Xiaomei and Tiandi Company."

Li Xiaomei's efforts have won her many honors. In 2014, she was named a national advanced individual in social poverty alleviation, and this year she was shortlisted in the initial evaluation for the 2015 China Poverty Eradication Award.