Season of Harvest: Rural e-commerce helps boost potato farmers' livelihoods

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02:17

China's first farmers' harvest festival will kick off on Sunday. Potato farmers in Chengde, Hebei province are expecting a good harvest this year. Sun Tianyuan finds out how small potatoes can help growers achieve prosperity.

Potatoes and more potatoes. Farmers have been digging their "golden nuggets" out of the ground. Zhang Baoli, a local from Weichang Manchu and Mongolian autonomous county, is looking forward to a fat harvest.

ZHANG BAOLI POTATO FARMER "My potato field used to be small, around a hundred mu, but it's now 10 times bigger. Production also went from two hundred tons to three thousand per season."

With help from the local government and an online fresh food distributor, 60-thousand farmers in the county were lifted out of poverty.

DING MINGYA, AGRONOMIST AGRICULTURE & ANIMAL HUSBANDRY BUREAU, WEICHANG COUNTY "Potato-growing is Weichang county's leading industry in poverty alleviation. We have 700 thousand mu of potatoes in total. And the government has provided fostering policies, including subsidies in mechanized farming and storage facilities."

Mecai, a Beijing-based online fresh food supplier, started this program several years ago. The company created its e-commerce platform in answer to the State Council's call to boost and innovate rural agricultural services.

MENG LINGWEI, MANAGER DEPARTMENT OF ROOT VEGETABLES, MEICAI.COM "We've created a direct link for farmers and cooperatives to ship their goods directly to restaurants in cities across the nation, cutting out the middle-man to leave farmers with more profits. We've also provided technical support, including seed selection, sowing, fertilization and watering."

Online sales of agricultural products in China's rural areas exceeded 250 billion yuan last year. That accounted for 20 percent of the total e-commerce transaction volume. And the number is estimated to reach 800 billion by 2020. As China's poverty alleviation efforts continue, they'll create more work for rural e-commerce.

SUN TIANYUAN CHENGDE "As small as it may seem, this is farmers' golden ticket to wealth and prosperity. Now there's only one wish on their minds, a good harvest this year, and all the years to come. STY, CGTN. Chengde, Hebei province.