The Farming Story of Pearl Farming Tycoon Xiang Yuande

    Xiang Yuande, male, born in April 1958 in Hanshou County, Hunan, now 49 years old. He currently serves as Chairman and General Manager of Hunan Xiangbalao Pearl Co., Ltd., Vice Chairman of the Changde Pearl Association, President of the Hanshou County Pearl Industry Association, a member of the Fourth Changde Municipal Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), and a standing committee member of the Sixth Hanshou County CPPCC. At present, he has more than 8,000 mu of pearl farming bases, more than 8 million pearl mussels suspended for cultivation, and personal assets exceeding 10 million yuan.

Xiang Yuande

    For nearly 20 years, Xiang Yuande has been engaged in the farming and development of freshwater pearls, continuously enriching his farming techniques. In particular, when distance education was piloted in Hanshou County in 2003, Xiang Yuande seemed to have found a "martial arts secret manual." Under the guidance of a computer teacher, he studied diligently and quickly mastered basic computer operating skills. Through the sky and ground networks of distance education, he earnestly studied pearl farming techniques, humbly sought advice from experts within and outside the province, and exchanged ideas with peers from various places, quickly raising his farming techniques to a new and higher level. Through repeated practice and bold exploration, and on the basis of continuously summarizing experience and learning from others, he innovated techniques in seedling mussel breeding, juvenile mussel cultivation, pearl mussel suspension cultivation, disease prevention and control, and scientific management, greatly improving the survival rate, pearl formation rate, and high-quality rate of pearl mussels. He successively created the miracle of 12 three-year-old mussels producing 500 grams of pearls and a high-quality rate of more than 15%, and produced premium-grade pearls with a particle size of more than 13 mm. Through his dedicated study of freshwater pearl farming techniques, Xiang Yuande's farming level and output efficiency became the highest in the province and leading in the country. He not only became a technical authority in the industry, but also received full recognition from relevant higher-level departments. In September 2004, he presided over drafting and completed the formulation of the "Technical Specification for Freshwater Non-nucleated Pearl Farming" standard issued by the Hunan Provincial Department of Agriculture. The implementation of this specification played an important role in improving the technical level of pearl farming.

    Under his leadership, the Hanshou County Pearl Industry Association actively cooperated with distance education, complementing each other's strengths and effectively promoting the development of the county's pearl industry and the in-depth development of distance education learning and application activities. The association actively supported the distance education cause, helping village-level terminal sites solve more than 11,000 yuan in operating funds, with funds used for distance education learning and application activities reaching more than 20,000 yuan. The association actively joined forces with distance education to establish learning and training bases at 25 village-level distance education sites in 10 major pearl-producing townships, including Yangtaohu, Yanwanghu, Zhoukou, and Guantouzui, making full use of distance education equipment and advanced teaching methods to organize farmers and Party members and the masses to learn pearl farming techniques. The Party members and masses of Nangan Village in Guantouzui Town were among the beneficiaries.

    Since 2004, Xiang Yuande has visited the Nangan Village distance education site 7 times to teach pearl farming techniques to the village's Party members and masses, and established a farming demonstration base in Nangan Village. Under Xiang Yuande's tutoring and demonstration, the village developed 2,000 mu of pearl farming, and more than 100 farming households embarked on the road to prosperity. In recent years, the association has held 3 county-wide large-scale technical training sessions, training more than 2,000 farming households; held 60 technical lectures in villages and fishing grounds, reaching more than 5,000 person-times; and distributed more than 15,000 copies of technical materials free of charge. In order to provide technical services to every household, Xiang Yuande used the distance education network to guide farming households online, personally lectured on techniques in several key major farming townships, and took the initiative to solve technical problems on site. According to incomplete statistics, over the past 6 years, Xiang Yuande has provided more than 30,000 yuan in money and goods to support disadvantaged farming households. At present, Hanshou's annual pearl output value is more than 100 million yuan, the per capita income of pearl farmers has increased by more than 200 yuan, and nearly 10,000 pearl farming households have embarked on the road to prosperity.

    In 2004, Xiang Yuande invested 15 million yuan to establish his first company, Hunan Xiangbalao Pearl Co., Ltd., launching Hanshou's first local pearl brand, "Balao Pearl." Perhaps because of his fame as "Xiang Balao" in the pearl industry, combined with the superior quality of Hanshou pearls and exquisite processing techniques, within just a few months, the pearl jewelry produced by his company was renowned throughout Hunan, Guangdong, and the Jiangsu-Zhejiang region, and sold well in Hong Kong, China, the United States, and other places. At the end of 2004, his company was recognized by the Changde Municipal Government as a municipal-level leading enterprise.

    He has received various commendations and awards from the city, county, and township more than 20 times, and was rated as an advanced individual in the industry 5 times. From 2002 to 2004, he was awarded the title of "Rural Star Economic Major Household" by the Hanshou County Party Committee and County Government for 3 consecutive years. In 2003, he was rated as a model worker and outstanding CPPCC member by the Changde Municipal Government and Municipal CPPCC. At the same time, he also won titles such as "Changde City, County, Township, and Village Outstanding Practical Talent" and "Advanced Society Member of the Municipal Science and Technology Association," and received an honorary certificate from the County Party Committee United Front Work Department and the County Federation of Industry and Commerce for "participating in and sponsoring the 'Poor College Students Guangcai Cause' activity."