Chongqing- Recently in Fengjie County, the 4th White Emperor City International Poetry Festival and Green Development • Consumption-Based Poverty Alleviation Conference was held between December 14th to 16th. The event also featured an orange industry exhibition in Binhe Park and forums themed on overcoming challenges and promoting the Fengjie glasses industry, which is striving to develop the sixth-largest glasses industrial park in China with an annual output of 5 billion yuan.

Qianqiubang is a location I have given the English name of Thousand Hills Orchard. It is a perfect case example of how rural revitalization has not only alleviated poverty but has actually delivered considerable affluence to the lives of county residents.

Thousand Hills is a rural cooperative involving a number of local households and business people. The orchard sits on a picturesque hillside overlooking the emerald Yangtze River waters in a picture of serenity. The cooperative planted between 30-40,000 navel orange trees of differing varieties over roughly 80 acres of land. While the local government developed the local road infrastructure, the orchard itself was funded privately through the rural cooperative and even built an irrigation system to draw water from the Yangtze during the drier seasons.

Thousand Hills Orchard produces 1000 tons of navel oranges yearly in the Fengjie countryside and is a key industry driving poverty alleviation in the county.

Mr. Yang Minghua is a major stakeholder in the cooperative, and he explained that his household income used to be around 10,000 yuan per year before they ran the orchard. However, this figure has grown to around 50,000 thanks to the high quality of their fruit, the production quantity, and a dedicated e-commerce team that receives orders for dispatch right alongside the orchard. This way, the oranges are as fresh as possible upon delivery to customers nationwide.

Following the conference opening ceremony and naval orange exhibition, our Fengjie trip concluded with a fruit picking experience at Thousand Hills Orchard, where Mr. Yang Minghua and his team warmly accompanied us to share their story of prosperity.