5,000 kg of Sichuan peppers spoiled at toll station after hours-long dispute

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Staff at a toll station in Hongya county, southwest China’s Sichuan Province on Thursday refused to let eight trucks carrying peppers pass free of charge, leading to a dispute long enough to make over 5,000 kilograms of peppers go bad.

The eight vehicles carrying 80 tons of peppers had arrived to the passage at around 4:00 a.m., with the aim of using the free "Green Channel" just like they did before. However, their plans did not go as they had wanted as they were asked to pay a toll fee of 3,000 yuan (439 US dollars).

The Cover Photo

“They suddenly said peppers can’t use the channel, so they wouldn’t let us pass,” Zhao Lin, manager of the pepper company, told The Cover. “In the past, the toll stations had discussed the issue and agreed that peppers should enjoy the benefit.”

But Zhao's statement was in contradiction to the head of the Hongya’s northern toll station.

“We’ve been trying to charge fees but failed. The drivers had (previously) threatened to block the lanes, forcing us to release the trucks,” he said, adding that they didn’t mean to make things difficult for the farmers, and stressing that they were simply following national policies.

The argument over whether to pass first and then pay or pay up before hitting the road lasted an agonizing 11 hours, which caused more than 5,000 kilograms of peppers, worth at 60,000 yuan, to become spoiled.

During the heated negotiations, Zhao proposed releasing the trucks first and staying to hammer out an agreement – however, his suggestion faced rejection.

The Cover Photo

But can peppers really go through the "Green Channel"?

In principle, no. That's according to the latest “List of Fresh Agricultural Products” that can enjoy the preferential policy jointly issued by the Ministry of Transport, the National Development and Reform Commission, and the Ministry of Finance, in 2011.

However, that's only half of the story.

An official at the Ministry of Transport later explained that each province or region was allowed to expand the state-level list based on their needs. For instance, Hainan Province has Areca nuts, a local product, to its list.

On Thursday night, the local government announced on its official account on China's Twitter-like Weibo that they are currently making demands to relevant departments to include peppers and other local agricultural products to the list.