The Planting Story of Shi Jun, a Large-Scale Grower of Salted Yangcao

    Shi Jun runs a large-scale operation in a new agricultural industry - salted yangcao. He has a very short buzz cut and a dark complexion, and when he talks about the secrets to making this venture grow and prosper, he is especially proud.  

"Yangcao is a specialty agricultural product of Yangzhong. How to make my salted yangcao products a smash hit has always been the direction I strive for." During his business operations, he once discovered that the yangcao he collected from local people was different from what he pickled himself. The yangcao he pickled had a much more tender texture than what the farmers provided, with no gritty mouthfeel. "Why is this? Why didn't this happen before?" Shi Jun was a thoughtful man. He compared and analyzed the pickling process, consulted various relevant materials, and sought advice from the Zhenjiang Fermented Food Research Institute, and ultimately found that the problem lay in the salt used for pickling.  

It turned out that this time, in order to save costs, he had happened to use coarse salt, while what the farmers delivered was pickled with edible salt. Although this unprocessed coarse salt was low in price, it was very suitable for pickling yangcao. "To open up the market for a product, taste is what matters. If my yangcao pickled with coarse salt tastes better than others', then it will have a broader market." This discovery delighted him greatly.  

Because of its good taste, his "Zhengkun Brand" salted yangcao quickly opened up the market, becoming a designated welfare benefit for many local enterprises and departments, and was exported in large quantities as gifts. The product was well received by customers upon launch, so he invested in opening a 50-mu yangcao planting base, but it still could not meet market demand. In order to further expand the scale of operations, he put his mind to work again, and began paying out of his own pocket to wholesale coarse salt. Before each year's yangcao pickling season, he gave salt free of charge to contract farmers, and through posting notices, distributing flyers, and other promotional methods, he promoted the advantages of pickling with coarse salt to individual farmers and notified them to go to the food factory to collect salt for free.  

With free coarse salt, the farmers' enthusiasm "doubled." Ordinary farmers mostly used edible salt to pickle yangcao, which cost more. Shi Jun's free salt distribution made farmers feel they were getting a better deal, and they all joined his "unofficial pickling army."  

Shi Jun also told us about another proud move in his business. Once, when the raw material purchase volume was already full, quite a few individual farmers still came one after another to deliver their own pickled raw materials. Someone at the factory suggested that they could lower the purchase price to buy them. After careful consideration, Shi Jun decided to still purchase at the original price and established a protected purchase price for raw materials. When the farmers learned of this, their enthusiasm for planting grew even higher. Everyone said, "With Factory Manager Shi's protected price, all we need to do is focus on planting and pickling the yangcao well."  

Some people did not understand, but Shi Jun always insisted on this practice. He said, "If I don't raise the price to protect the farmers' enthusiasm for planting, then next year they will plant less or even not plant yangcao at all. By then, I'll have no raw materials and no semi-finished products, and my business scale will be affected."  

At present, Shi Jun's Zhengkun enterprise is thriving, with sales growing year after year. Its products have expanded from domestic sales to exports. His "Zhengkun Brand" salted yangcao has been invited many times to participate in the Jiangsu Province Famous, Special and Premium Agricultural Products Trade Fair and the Jiangsu Province Agricultural Standardization Achievement Exhibition. Now, the production technology for Zhengkun salted yangcao has been included by Jiangsu Province in the Technical Regulations for the Processing of Jinhua Cai.