Upturn in potato farmers’ fortunes

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May 10, 2019

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Upturn in potato farmers’ fortunes

Source: Xinhua | 00:57 UTC+8 May 10, 2019 |

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In northwest Gansu Province, known for its arid climate, potato is the main crop. But it had failed to create much fortune for growers in the past.

About 15 years ago, when Li Xingze began to chair the Lantian Potato Industry Group in Dingxi City, the biggest challenge to run the company was a lack of quality potatoes in the market.

The situation had existed for years. Farmers used to sell their potatoes to dealers, but instead of paying cash, dealers issued IOUs in many cases and farmers ended up with no income by the end of the year.

Li Caihua has been growing potatoes for over two decades. “All I got were a bunch of IOUs, I disliked the dealers but had no other choice,” she said.

The biggest losers of the IOU practice in the long run were the potato companies because no farmers were willing to sell their products any longer and many had given up on growing the spuds.

So Li Xingze came up with a new model — signing contracts with local cooperatives and purchasing potatoes directly from the growers.

“We depend on the farmers to make profits. If they abandon the land, what can we do?” he said. “We encourage farmers to grow high-starch potatoes by providing them with seeds and subsidies and purchase at higher prices, so the growers can have more income.”

Li Caihua joined a local cooperative last year. She sold all her potatoes to Li Xingze’s firm and was paid tens of thousands of yuan in cash on the spot. “Now I don’t have to worry about the sale of my potatoes,” she said.

More than 50,000 households have registered with the Lantian group, of which about 5,000 are low-income families. The total potato-growing area tops 6,600 hectares in Dingxi and over 6,000 such cooperatives have been established.

Now Li Xingze is nicknamed “Mr Potato,” as his firm produces a quarter of the country’s potato starch on the market.

Liu Xiaoping, a local official of Xingyuan township, said the new model had attracted more locals to grow potatoes. “Every October when the potatoes are ripe, there is a long queue of growers riding tricycles to sell them. Sometimes it can be over 200 cars and we are busy until midnight,” Liu said.

Quality produce brings Li Xingze more profit. In 2010, the Lantian group was just one of the small potato starch firms in Dingxi. By last year, Lantian had become the biggest potato starch producer in China.

Farmers have also seen their purse getting bigger. The average income of local growers was 20,000 yuan (US$2,947) last year, 8,300 yuan higher than the previous year.

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Upturn in potato farmers’ fortunes

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