On the eve of the Spring Festival, reporters from the main station came to Yanling County, Xuchang, Henan. The pillar industry here used to be green seedlings, with markets spread across 27 provinces and cities across the country. While exploring transformation and development, they set their sights on wax plum blossoms. In Yanling, the reporter got to know Sun Zhihao, a major wintersweet grower, and saw what he was busy with for this Spring Festival.
As the Spring Festival approaches, the number of customers at the flower and tree market in Yanling County is three to four times more than usual. When the reporter saw Sun Zhihao, he was busy greeting guests. While Sun Zhihao was busy greeting guests, he was also busy preparing to participate in the 10th Winter Plum Festival in Yanling County. An ancient poem goes, "The Yanling Wintersweet Festival crowns the world." Although the Yanling Wintersweet Festival has been held for nine times, it is mainly for cultural exchanges. This year, everyone is working hard to promote the market and expand the industry.
Sun Zhihao has planted more than 10,000 wintersweet trees. He cherishes this opportunity to appear and hopes to have good sales at the Wintersweet Festival. Sun Zhihao used to be in the greening seedling business. At that time, he only wholesaled and made money quickly. However, as other places followed the planting trend, the market gradually exceeded demand, so that the 50 acres of eucalyptus trees planted by Sun Zhihao could only be sold as wood residue. . Sun Zhihao, who was once confused, visited several flower and tree markets across the country for half a year. He found that as the quality of life improved, people's demand for flowers was increasing.
Sun Zhihao, a flower farmer in Yanling County, Xuchang City, Henan Province: Wintersweet is the county flower of our Yanling County. We also have wintersweet bonsais. People in the north also like to put a few pots of flowers at home during the Chinese New Year. We feel that Wintersweet just fills this gap in the market.
The winter plums in Yanling County are golden in color and rich in fragrance. The modeling skills of winter plum bonsai are also an intangible cultural heritage of Henan Province. Optimistic about the new demand for fresh flowers from ordinary people, Sun Zhihao and many dealers of green seedlings changed their direction and planted wintersweet instead. However, it is difficult to plant beautiful wintersweet flowers. Planting flowers is very different from planting trees. Pruning is not good, let alone shaping, and the flowers do not even bloom.
Sun Zhihao: For the extensive type, on the construction site, partial crowns and broken branches of greening trees can be sold, it doesn’t matter. But if it is to be done in thousands of households, every pot must be refined.
Yu Fake, the intangible inheritor of the craftsmanship of making ancient wintersweet from Henan Province: When the heart is strong, the flower heart is weak. Only when it is weak will it grow well.
Wintersweet bonsai pays attention to its shape, and the price in the market will vary several times depending on the appearance. To this end, Sun Zhihao specifically sought out the intangible inheritor of the wax plum bonsai technique to ask for advice.
In recent years, the winter plum bonsai in Yanling County has not only inherited ancient skills, but also sought innovation and developed many new varieties. This kind of small bonsai placed on the table is especially popular in the market.
Li Gaofeng, the intangible inheritor of wintersweet cultivation skills in Xuchang City: In the process of our cultivation, the technology will become more mature, the quality will improve, and the price will drop, so that it can enter thousands of households.
It takes three or four years to cultivate a wintersweet bonsai, and many branches need to be cut off. During the Spring Festival, Sun Zhihao and other flower farmers discovered that all these branches were turned into treasure.
A few wintersweet branches, more than 30 yuan, can fill the house with fragrance and delight the eyes for more than a month. Smelling the fragrance of wintersweet, netizens praised: I felt very good all of a sudden, what a surprise!
These days, there are more and more orders for fresh-cut branches from all over the country. Sun Zhihao and his family go to work to pack and ship the orders together. Braving the cold wind every day, Sun Zhihao goes to the logistics park to deliver goods. Yanling has newly opened more than a dozen direct lines for flowers and seedlings, allowing winter plums to be sold to all parts of the country more conveniently.
Sun Zhihao: In the past, it took half a month or a month to travel to remote areas, especially Xinjiang. Sometimes the flowers are damaged if they are left on for too long. It’s faster now, and you can reach Xinjiang in three days.
Although live streaming has become very common, and small store owners have stepped in to become anchors, this is a bit difficult for Sun Zhihao. In order to seize this Spring Festival business opportunity, Sun Zhihao, who cannot speak Mandarin and is thin-skinned, walked into the live broadcast room for the first time. Unexpectedly, the first pot of flowers was sold in a short time. This greatly increased Sun Zhihao's confidence.
The 10th Winter Plum Festival in Yanling County finally opened. In the exhibition hall, network anchors were working hard to broadcast live in front of various booths. After several live broadcasts, Sun Zhihao also launched a banner for auctioning wax plums, allowing his wax plums to gain popularity on the Internet.
The warm atmosphere at the scene made Sun Zhihao full of energy. He performed well at the auction. In just half an hour, a cart of wax plums was sold out.
Experts and customers from all over the world commented on the wax plum bonsai with different shapes and made purchases one after another. Derivative products such as wax plum tea and wax plum essential oil also attracted a lot of attention at the Winter Plum Festival.
Yuan Shulin, County Magistrate of Yanling County, Xuchang City: The wintersweet industry has just started. Our government now needs to use the power of the organization to bring it to the market and increase the confidence of our flower farmers. At the same time, the next step is to combine culture and tourism to lengthen the industrial chain.
(CCTV reporters Wang Yan, Li Xin, Zhang Qianqian, Li Ziguo, Henan Station)
(CCTV news client)
