Xuwen, Guangdong, the southernmost tip of Chinese mainland, is one of the first small cities in China to feel the spring. It has a history of pineapple cultivation for nearly 100 years, and is the largest pineapple producing area in China, known as the "pineapple sea". Before becoming popular, Xuwen pineapple, which relied too much on offline sales channels, was once blocked by the epidemic.
On February 19th, 2020, led by Pinduoduo, a special live broadcast to help farmers was launched in pineapple fields. At that time, the county magistrate personally walked into the live broadcast room to help farmers, cut and eat pineapples, and spoke for Xuwen pineapple, which attracted more than 300,000 netizens to watch and nearly 300,000 kilograms of pineapples were sold out. This live broadcast also opened up business ideas for local farmers, and live delivery and online circulation began to become one of the main sales models of Xuwen pineapple.
In the past four years, the "pineapple planting army" has gradually grown into a "pineapple selling army", and Xuwen pineapple has become one of the "top streams" of the fruit circle. Pinduoduo platform data shows that Xuwen pineapple sales increased by 60% in the past year. From the purchase area, Zhejiang surpassed Guangdong to become the largest pineapple consumption province in Xuwen, followed by Jiangsu, Sichuan and Shanghai, and entered the top five.
In late February, this year’s first Xuwen pineapple was listed first. It is understood that the planting area of Xuwen pineapple this year is about 350,000 mu, with an annual output of about 700,000 tons, accounting for nearly 15% of the listed pineapples. The price of fresh fruit is stable at 0.8-1 yuan/kg, and the purchase price of large pineapples can reach 1.2 yuan/kg.
The sales volume of fruit is also a demonstration barometer of the price of Lingnan Jiaguo. Luo Hongxia, secretary of the xuwen county County Party Committee, fully affirmed the live broadcast of helping farmers, which was promoted by the cooperation of the government, the platform and the media, at the recent 2024 "Call the World to Eat Xuwen Pineapple" activity and "The First Live Broadcast of Pinduoduo in 219, 2020". Whether in Guangdong or in the whole country, this live broadcast has a very obvious demonstration significance. "
Luo Hongxia pointed out that this action of finding a market for agricultural products online was also highly recognized and supported by the Guangdong Provincial Department of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, and then it set off a nationwide wave of live broadcast to help agriculture. The "Xuwen model" also became the most popular new model for agricultural e-commerce development in that year.
Luo Hongxia, secretary of xuwen county County Party Committee, summed up and reviewed "The first live broadcast of Tiantou in Pinduoduo on 219, 2020". Photography | Shen Zhao
"The county magistrate’s live broadcast is a beneficial practice for Xu Wen to lead fruit farmers to try a new path of agricultural goods on the Internet, and it is also the starting point for Pinduoduo to help farmers live broadcast. The successful landing of this’ experiment’ also benefited from the creation and establishment of a new model of Guangdong agricultural products’ 12221′ market system. " The person in charge of relevant business in Pinduoduo said that in the future, the company will continue the policy of benefiting farmers such as zero commission on agricultural products, and improve the ultra-short chain of agricultural products by tilting resources such as 10 billion subsidies, 10,000-person group and optimizing supply chain, so that consumers all over the country can eat fresh and affordable Guangdong agricultural products, and help farmers increase their income and get rich and revitalize rural industries.
From "unsalable fruit" to "rich fruit"
In February 2020, it was the harvest season of Xuwen pineapple, but it caught up with the epidemic. "From Beijing to Xuwen, the flow of people along the way is very small." Some buyers recalled at the symposium, "Especially when going to Xuwen by boat from Haikou, it seems that there are less than five people except the staff. There are fewer people on board, and I have a feeling of chartering a boat. "
The opening of the county magistrate’s live broadcast ignited Xu Wen’s vitality and vitality. In just half an hour, it attracted more than 300,000 netizens’ attention. During the two-hour online activity, 30,000 pieces of pineapples were originally sold out, and 20,000 pieces of goods were urgently transferred in the live broadcast room, which eventually drove the sales of pineapples to nearly 300,000 Jin. After the live broadcast, xuwen county local farmers’ Pinduoduo stores accumulated 30,000 fans overnight and sold 51,000 pieces of pineapples in the past 20 days.
This live broadcast is a beneficial practice for Xuwen local government to lead fruit farmers to try the new path of online agricultural goods. Local farmers have opened up their business ideas, learned to live broadcast goods and open stores online for sale. Xuwen pineapple has gradually become a regional public agricultural product brand recognized by consumers all over the country, and the network uplink experiment of Xuwen pineapple is called "Xuwen mode".
In order to increase the market influence of Xuwen pineapple and build it into a "city business card", the local government continued to promote digital marketing and cultivated a live broadcast force that could not be taken away. Nowadays, doing e-commerce no longer needs government promotion, and more locals are spontaneously doing agricultural e-commerce.
After 1995, Xu Wen, a local guy, Zou Ziying returned to his hometown from Guangzhou last year and tried to start an agricultural product e-commerce in Pinduoduo. "Because I found that many friends around me made money from this."
In April-June and August-November, the two peak seasons of pineapple sales, Zou sold Xuwen pineapple in Pinduoduo by himself, and in the rest of the time, he managed local specialties such as Sakyamuni, Apple Banana and Red Heart Papaya. Relying on the policy of benefiting farmers such as zero commission for agricultural products on the platform, in the eight months up to the end of 2023, the cumulative sales volume of stores exceeded 300,000, and the profits also reached expectations.
The diversified consumer demand of Pinduoduo platform makes Xuwen pineapple find more possibilities. Take Zou’s own 100 mu of land as an example. "In the past, big fruits sold well in the offline market, but small and medium-sized fruits were often only sold to canneries or even rotted in the ground; Nowadays, with the help of the e-commerce platform, both Zhongguo and Daguo have a broader market, and the overall output value has increased by 10%. "
Zou, who tasted the "sweetness" of e-commerce business, was full of self-motivation. Just after the Spring Festival holiday, he arranged a new year’s work plan. "We have been stocking goods recently, and we expect to link up around Qingming." This year, he decided to increase investment in Pinduoduo platform, expanding the number of stores from more than 10 last year to 20-30, and strengthening the control of pineapple quality.
In addition to selling his own pineapples, Zou Ziying helped nearly 200 growers around to sell pineapples last year, and the purchase price was generally higher than that of offline stalls. "For every kilogram of pineapples we sell, farmers can earn 0.1-0.2 yuan more."
Xuwen pineapple ushered in a bumper harvest, and fruit farmers were very busy. Photography | Shen Zhao
In 2020-2022, Xuwen pineapple ushered in a high-light moment, and the field purchase price rose instead of falling. At the peak, it broke through 3 yuan/Jin, setting a sales record. The "slow-moving fruit" that once plagued local fruit farmers has turned into a "rich fruit".
At present, the "pineapple sea" industry is becoming more and more mature, and Xu Wen’s "pineapple planting army" has become a "pineapple selling army". Buyers and sellers from all over the country gathered here, and large trucks with license plates from different provinces stopped at the roadside, waiting for the pineapples to be loaded and shipped out.
Leverage big data and big live broadcast to hit the "world pineapple"
Xu Wen pineapple Jedi reborn, had to mention a set of digital passwords: "12221".
In 2019, in order to implement Xuwen pineapple brand building marketing, Guangdong Provincial Department of Agriculture and Rural Affairs set up a "12221" special working group and put forward a "12221" market system, namely, building "1" big data of agricultural products, forming "2" teams of buyers in sales areas and cultivating brokers in production areas, expanding "2" big markets in sales areas and production areas, and planning buyers to enter production areas and agricultural products to enter big markets.
In the past five years, the working group has always come to Xuwen in the spring to sum up the key points of the stage, bring thoughts and suggestions, and help fruit farmers sell their fruits. Winter goes and spring comes, and the pineapple harvest in the new season is coming. The blueprint of Xuwen pineapple development is gradually clear at the symposium: e-commerce, digitalization and internationalization will become the key words of the next stage.
This year’s newly released No.1 Document of the Central Committee clearly proposes to implement the high-quality development project of rural e-commerce, promote the construction of county-level e-commerce live broadcast bases, and develop the online sales of rural local products. Xuwen county is also vigorously promoting the live broadcast sales of e-commerce, holding thousands of people training, thousands of people live broadcast and other activities, and striving to become "the first county of live broadcast e-commerce in China".
In the spring of 2020, the first county magistrate live broadcast supported by Pinduoduo kicked off the "Xuwen Mode".
Xuwen county also followed the digital wave and launched AI Pineapple Jun, hoping to continue to deepen Xuwen Pineapple’s "12221 market system construction" under the background of data becoming new agricultural materials, mobile phones becoming new agricultural tools and live broadcast becoming new farm work, and help solve various problems such as pineapple planting, preservation, processing, logistics, publicity and marketing with AI technology, organically integrate data elements with the whole process of agriculture, vigorously develop new e-commerce formats such as live broadcast and short video, and explore.
It is reported that about 316 tons of pineapples have been exported to Russia, Kyrgyzstan, North Korea and other countries this year, of which North Korea is exporting for the first time. On February 29th, a batch of Xuwen pineapples from Zhongli Group was also about to be exported to North America. The appearance of AI Pineapple King provided a platform for Xuwen Pineapple to break through geographical restrictions and become a "world pineapple" from "China Pineapple".
To make Xuwen pineapple industry bigger and stronger, we must pay attention to both production and sales. While unblocking the sales link, the local government also actively promoted the diversification of production, and continued to explore industrialization, food and cleanliness, and launched new products such as pineapple grilled fish, fresh-cut small pineapples, pineapple moon cakes, pineapple rice cakes, and pineapple prefabricated dishes. At the forum on February 29th, the leaders also officially unveiled the "Xuwen Pineapple Prefabricated Vegetable Raw Material Direct Supply Base". This laid a foundation for Xuwen pineapple to improve its industrial chain and broaden its commercial channels.
With the popularity of Xuwen pineapple, "Xuwen Model" is gradually popularized in Guangdong Province. Previously, Pinduoduo signed a cooperation framework agreement with the Guangdong Provincial Department of Agriculture and Rural Affairs to jointly help Guangdong’s featured agricultural products enter the city, and jointly incubate 50 brands of Guangdong’s featured agricultural products to fully help Guangdong’s digital agriculture "new infrastructure". From Kaiping duck egg, Suixi sweet potato and Lingnan litchi to Huilai abalone, Meizhou honey pomelo and Chaozhou tea, Pinduoduo can be seen behind the rise of these agricultural specialties.
According to the data, in 2020 alone, Pinduoduo launched a total of more than 240 live broadcasts to help farmers, covering 29 provinces, municipalities directly under the Central Government and autonomous regions. A total of more than 430 city, county and district principals entered the live broadcast room to promote local agricultural (sub-) products, which generated a total of 670 million orders to help farmers, and sold more than 4.12 billion kilograms of agricultural (sub-) products, helping 1.13 million households.
In the future, Pinduoduo will continue to take measures such as resource inclination and supply chain optimization to accelerate Guangdong goods from villages to cities, and promote the standardization, branding and digitalization of Guangdong agricultural products.
