"Hello everyone, I am an ordinary farmer from the Andong Town, Qianwan New Area, Ningbo, and also the head of the local Ali Fruit and Vegetable Professional Cooperative..." On the stage, said Jin Lishen dressed in a suit and leather shoes, and with a loud voice. Being able to come to this Roundtable Dialogue today, he's extremely excited.
This is the Roundtable Dialogue on "telling the world a good story of the Chinese path to modernization" held by the Zhejiang International Communication Center and the Foreign Languages Press in Beijing. 54-year old Jin Lishen is the only invitee from Ningbo and the only agricultural representative from Zhejiang.
On the other end of the "Roundtable" was David Ferguson, Honorary English Editor in Chief of the Foreign Languages Press. He wrote a book titled "China's Development in the New Era: The Zhejiang Experience", which tells the story of China's development represented by Zhejiang from the perspective of a foreign expert. And Jin Lishen is one of the "protagonists" in this book.
From the fields to the "Roundtable", Jin Lishen has been "walking" for over 30 years——
He is from Andong and his ancestors have been farming for generations. Andong was once a famous salt production base in China and a famous cotton producing area in eastern Zhejiang. In the 1980s, Andong began large-scale planting of cotton.
"I witnessed my fellow villagers working hard to plant cotton on saline alkali land, but their income was very meager." How to find a path to prosperity for them, Jin Lishen has been pondering this question.
In the late 1980s, Jin Lishen began his entrepreneurial journey. Faced with unsold grapes in the local market, he had an idea and found boxes for eggs, duck eggs, and baskets made of bamboo to pack the grapes. After packing the grapes, he hitchhiked by the roadside to the city market to sell them... With this entrepreneurial spirit, the name "Jin Lishen" became increasingly known to more and more people.
In the late 1990s, his planting territory continued to expand, and in addition to grapes, vegetables such as broccoli and soybeans, etc. also appeared on his farmland.
In 2011, with strong government support, Jin Lishen embarked on a new journey and began to enter the agricultural product processing industry. "I process grapes, broccoli and other fruits and vegetables for initial processing, and then export them to Japan, Europe, America and other places." His ideas have broadened rapidly, and this measure not only effectively deals with excess agricultural products, but also creates a large number of job opportunities for the local area.
Personal strivings always complement the development of the times——
In 2001, China joined the World Trade Organization. The spring breeze of economic development has also blown into the wholesale industry of fruits and vegetables. Jin Lishen's customers sprung up like mushrooms after rain, and his business has been thriving;
In 2008, the Hangzhou Bay Cross-Sea Bridge was opened, reducing the travelling time from Andong to Shanghai from the original 10 hours to nearly 2 hours. The convenient transportation and logistics have greatly improved the sales of local fruits and vegetables, and the income of farmers such as Jin Lishen has achieved significant growth...
Nowadays, Jin Lishen's Ali Fruit and Vegetable Professional Cooperative has developed into a service center integrating agricultural product production, storage, initial processing, and purchase and sales. The annual sales of grapes and vegetables reach 3,000 tons and 15,000 tons respectively, with an annual sales revenue of over 60 million yuan. It can also flexibly regulate export volume according to domestic market conditions. At the same time, the cooperative has radiated a surrounding area of tens of thousands of mu, driving more than 1,000 farmers.
Today, Jin Lishen turned the Chinese path to modernization miracle created in the saline alkali land into a "souvenir" that can be seen and touched. He took it to the scene and gave it to David Ferguson personally two bottles of wine made from "Kyoho" grapes. The grapes were planted by himself, and the wine was brewed by him.
At the scene, Jin Lishen also sent a sincere invitation to David Ferguson: "There are still tens of thousands of 'Ali' in rural areas of Zhejiang. I sincerely invite you to continue to visit this land and explore more 'Ali'!"
"As a representative of farmers, I feel very honored to be written into David's book and let the world see the story of our Ningbo farmers' hard working spirit and prosperity," Jin Lishen told reporters. The country attaches great importance to agricultural modernization, which makes him feel like he is in the spring breeze and deeply responsible, "I want to lead more villagers towards common prosperity and create more miracles on this land."
