Villagers reap harvest of greater dividends in spirit of cooperation

With experience in managing enterprises, Liu Houbin has adopted an innovative approach to poverty alleviation by taking a long-term view to helping impoverished villages.

"Market operation can not only upgrade traditional industries, but also reduce the dependence of local industries on the support of our poverty alleviation team," says Liu, 39.

In the cause of poverty alleviation, varied social powers are called for, Liu says. In the past decade, Shaanxi province has adopted a scheme that pairs enterprises with villages to help them work their way out of poverty.

The Shaanxi Investment Group is one of the enterprises that participated in the project and assisted local poverty alleviation efforts.

In May 2018, Liu, then-deputy general manager of the Shaanxi Yahua Coal Selling and Transportation Co Ltd, a subsidiary of the group, was assigned as a deputy chief of Baishui county.

At the time, Baishui was listed as a key county in the national poverty alleviation and development agenda, with 63 of its 123 villages suffering from poverty.

In order to get a grasp on the county's condition, Liu conducted thorough research upon arrival, invited experts to analyze the local soil and climate, and led local department leaders on field trips to other cities to learn from their experience.

He then proposed an advanced project that combines photovoltaics technology with mushroom farming, using intelligent systems and automatic control to supervise the process and improve efficiency.

In order to implement the project, the funds donated by the Shaanxi Investment Group to four villages under Baishui county were collected and the Lixiangting Poverty Alleviation Co, collectively owned by the villages, was established.

"When the funds were distributed, the villages had less than a million yuan ($141,069) for each project. Small projects have low risk tolerance," Liu says.

"Also, it takes a long time for the projects to make a profit, so we thought we should pool the funds and let them exercise their functions as soon as possible."

Liu's advanced concepts were not immediately accepted by the village leaders, let alone the residents.

Shiguan village is one of the four villages. Su Quanding, head of the village committee, says the village had qualms about this new approach and were initially unwilling to participate.

Liu then led the cadres from the four villages to other provinces adopting similar methods, and seeing their positive results, the villages agreed to work together.

The project was then launched and in October, 2019, a profit of 180,000 yuan was distributed in dividends for the first time.

Thirty percent of the revenue went to the impoverished households, 50 percent went to the other villagers, and the rest 20 percent was collectively owned by the villages.

Seeing the benefits, the villagers changed their minds and now support the project strongly, Su says.

Sun Suorong, a 58-year-old farmer in Shiguan village, used to have only 1,000 yuan left yearly for the entire family.

After Liu led the poverty alleviation team to the village, Sun actively participated in the mushroom farming project, and by the end of last year, the family's surplus exceeded 3,000 yuan.

"It's important to accept new things," Sun says. He is also very interested in the new mushroom products developed by Liu, including a kind of potted mushroom that serves educational and aesthetic purposes.

In over a year since Liu started working in Baishui, the county built an automatic mushroom production plant that can harvest millions of mushrooms per year, 13 intelligent greenhouses and a 175kw photovoltaic power plant.

By the end of 2018, 20 villages in the county and 1,885 households including over 7,000 people shook off poverty.

On Feb 27, the Shaanxi provincial government announced that Baishui county is no longer listed as an impoverished county.