Suqian’s century-old sericulture village “breaks out of its cocoon and is reborn” to enter the new Silk Road
Under the scorching sun, continuous mulberry leaves sway in the wind in Sericulture Village, Buzi Town, Sucheng District, Suqian City. Xu Bingwen, a 64-year-old silkworm farmer, neatly bundled the pruned mulberry branches together. “Our ancestors have made a living by raising silkworms for generations, and sericulture is a treasure. Mulberries, mulberry peels, and mulberry branches that silkworms don’t eat can be sold, and even mulberry roots can be sold for a lot of money.” Xu Bingwen said with a smile.
The Sericulture Village lives up to its name, with 916 households and 3,911 people, and 2,760 acres of land with 2,700 acres of mulberry trees. It is the only village-wide professional sericulture village in Suqian City. There is a century-old mulberry tree in the village surrounded by two people. It has lush branches and leaves and is full of vitality, witnessing the vicissitudes of the silkworm village.
Although I was “injured” by the mulberry, I never destroyed the mulberry
“Sericulture Village has a history of hundreds of years of growing mulberry and raising sericulture. It has gone through many ups and downs. It has tasted the joy of a good harvest and suffered the pain of almost no harvest.” Lu, president of the Sericulture Village Professional Cooperative. Tianqi said.
Historical data records that sericulture cultivation in Sericulture Village began in the Ming and Qing Dynasties. In the late 1950s, Suqian’s sericulture industry developed rapidly and reached its peak in 1994. The area of mulberry orchards exceeded 400,000 acres. “Every household has mulberries and every household raises sericulture.” Sericulture has become an important factor in increasing Suqian’s agricultural efficiency, farmers’ income, and financial gain. One of the pillar industries. At that time, there were 1,500 acres of sericulture in the Sericulture Village. About 70% of the villagers planted mulberry and raised sericulture. They built brick houses and small Western-style buildings. Almost every family was a “10,000-yuan household”.
Affected by factors such as the rapid development of mulberry orchards and the oversupply of silkworm cocoon production, the price of cocoon silk fell to a low point at the end of 1999, and the phenomenon of destroying mulberry and replacing it with grain crops began to appear in various places. “At that time, the price of silkworm cocoons was only about 4 yuan per kilogram. Mulberry gardens were destroyed in many surrounding places, but not a single mulberry tree was destroyed in the Sericulture Village.” Xu Meng, a 59-year-old villager in Group 6 of the Sericulture Village, started planting mulberry and raising silkworms from his ancestors. Seeing Sang, who had worked so hard, be destroyed at the drop of a hat, it was like having his “heart and soul” cut off. “Over the years, every time the price of cocoons drops, I cheer myself up and persevere. I believe everything will get better!” Lu Qijiang, a sericulture farmer who started raising sericulture in 1953, lamented: “I don’t want to see the situation of sericulture. Once traditional industries disappear in the hands of our generation, there is hope if we keep our roots.”
After entering the new century, cocoon and silk prices continue to fluctuate, the comparative benefits of mulberry and grain are still declining, the area of mulberry gardens continues to decrease, and sericulture production continues to shrink. Until around 2010, the price of cocoon silk gradually increased, and the benefit ratio of mulberry and grain reached 3:1, and the sericulture farmers in the sericulture village showed happy smiles again. Today, the sericulture village has become a well-known wealthy village, with annual benefits from the sericulture industry exceeding 30 million yuan. Last year, the per capita net income of villagers reached 36,000 yuan, which was three to four thousand yuan higher than the average level of residents in Sucheng District.
He Jingrui, director of the Sericulture Station of Suqian Agricultural Technology Comprehensive Service Center, said that in the mid-1990s, there were more than 20 towns and villages in Suqian County with more than 10,000 acres of mulberry gardens. Currently, the city’s sericulture area is about 20,000 acres. . Over the years, the mulberry garden area of the Sericulture Village has not only not decreased, but has expanded to 2,700 acres. “The villagers’ persistence and persistence in sericulture have taken deep root in their hearts and become a kind of cultural confidence.”
Jiang Ruoyong, a researcher at the Suqian Academy of Agricultural Sciences, believes that the core that determines the survival of sericulture is economic efficiency. When it is at a low point, if the local government is not far-sighted and does not stop the destruction of mulberry or is not good at using policy levers to regulate it, it will give a certain amount of Without subsidies, it will be difficult for silkworm farmers to tide over the difficulties. In the long run, compared with industries such as fruits and vegetables, the sericulture industry has small investment, large output, short cycle, and high comparative efficiency, so it is worth sticking to.
Persistence has the confidence to turn “injured” opportunities into vitality
“The stable development of the sericulture industry in Sericulture Village cannot be separated from the persistence of the villagers on the one hand, and strong support from the outside on the other, which gives the villagers the confidence to persevere and even turn a ‘hurt’ opportunity into an opportunity for development. “He Jingrui analyzed.
As early as the 1950s, Suqian, which was still at the county level at the time, established a silkworm nursery in Buzi Town, which was later changed to a silkworm breeding farm. The site was located in the Sericulture Village, and it was mainly responsible for sericulture cultivation, silkworm seed cultivation and technology promotion. . “When I was seven or eight years old, I helped my elders raise silkworms, and later I went to the town’s silkworm breeding farm to breed silkworms.” Lu Qizheng, who is in his 50s, lives in Group 5 of the Sericulture Village and has a 10-acre mulberry garden. “The silkworm breeding farm is right next to us. Everyone is confident in growing mulberry and raising sericulture. If you encounter any problems, you can always go to the farm to ask the technicians for help. The sericulture in our village is always the best in the surrounding area!”
Lu Qizheng was deeply impressed. In the 1980s and 1990s, the silkworm breeding farm sent technicians to every village to provide guidance on sericulture technology and promote new mulberry and new silkworm species. “Everyone is very motivated, competing for production and quality. We choose the best mulberry trees and choose the best silkworm seeds. Even when the price of silkworm cocoons is low, the quality of silkworm cocoons is still high.” Sell better than others.”
Lu Tianqi, who once served as the deputy director of the silkworm breeding farm, said that there are now more than 900 households in the sericulture village, and any person from any household will be a well-known expert in sericulture. Whenever the silkworm market is down, what everyone thinks about most is not destroying the mulberry trees, but how to reduce risks and losses. The mulberry species has changed from 711, which was not tall and has low yield, to Qiangsang No. 1, which has large leaves and high yield. The silkworm species has changed from the original silkworm to just one silkworm after it emerges from the cocoon.From 65 kilograms to 110 kilograms of cocoons now, the method of raising silkworms has changed from straw to square clusters. Every innovation has brought about improvements in efficiency and reduced the impact of the market downturn.
In order to ensure the income of sericulture farmers, the sericulture village has also established a professional sericulture cooperative to provide members with services such as the purchase of production materials. It also unifies the supply of silkworm seeds, unified mulberry orchard management, unified standard breeding, unified cooperative sales, and unified technical guidance. Give a second rebate. “In the past, vendors basically bought cocoons door-to-door, and the price fluctuated greatly, which had a great impact on the income of silkworm farmers.” Zhou Bingjun, deputy mayor of Buzi Town, said, “After the cooperative was established, it went to Anhui, Xuzhou, Xinyi and Zhejiang. Some places searched for suppliers and finally reached a cooperation intention with Nantong Xinyuan Cocoon Group. The other party purchased the cocoons at a guaranteed minimum price and at the same time gave members a second return of dividends.”
The towns and villages also organized sericulture farmers to visit and study to broaden their horizons; they established professional planting and breeding teams to solve sericulture technical problems; village cadres took the lead in demonstrating the planting and breeding of new varieties and new technologies… These have changed the situation of sericulture farmers working alone, and also Support confidence in industrial development. Amid market turmoil as cocoon prices have risen and fallen many times, the sericulture area of the Sericulture Village has not shrunk but has expanded. The “Buzi Silkworm Cocoons” produced have also been certified as national geographical indication products.
Inject modern elements and enter the new Silk Road
“Currently, most of the people growing mulberry and raising sericulture in the village are people in their 50s and 60s. Young people are unwilling to do it. I am really worried that sericulture will be discontinued in the hands of our generation.” Xu Meng said worriedly.
Sericulture is a labor-intensive industry. At present, most of the front-line practitioners are old and infirm, and their overall cultural and technical quality is not high. At the same time, there is a lack of efficient and labor-saving sericulture production technology and labor-saving sericulture machinery. The labor intensity is high, production efficiency is low, and the industry leader lacks motivation. He Jingrui analyzed in a research report that “if the traditional sericulture industry wants to retain its roots and rejuvenate its youthful vitality, it must plan the industrial layout according to local conditions, consolidate and stabilize the sericulture base, improve the organization of sericulture farmers, and promote the application of new varieties. , new technologies to increase the added value of the sericulture industry.”
How to inject modern elements into the traditional sericulture industry? Buzi Town and Silkworm Village continue to explore and practice. Chen Maohui, Secretary of the Party Committee of Buzi Town, said that the local area has held the “Sericulture Culture Tourism Festival” for five consecutive years and launched experience sericulture and mulberry picking tours; it has established a cooperative relationship with medicinal materials companies and has mulberry leaves, mulberry branch slices, mulberry roots, etc. Sales; build a logistics and trading center for agricultural and sideline products in the sericulture village, register a unified brand, and develop silk quilts, mulberry leaf tea, mulberry wine, etc. “In the past, mulberry cultivation and silkworm rearing followed the ‘Silk Road’, but now we follow the ‘Cultural Road’. The newly developed mulberry chicken, mulberry eggs, cold mulberry leaves, and fragrant Local specialty products such as silkworm chrysalis, mulberry leaf dumplings, and mulberry leaf tea are widely loved by tourists.
The town also specifically hired Zhou Bingjun, who works for a foreign company, and Han Kai, an expert in e-commerce, to serve as secretary of the Party branch of Sericulture Village, injecting fresh blood into the development of the industry. Han Kai led representatives of sericulture farmers to inspect and study in Nantong and other places, advocating the innovation of traditional sericulture methods, strengthening large village households, large-scale breeding models, promoting standard labor-saving co-breeding technology, etc., simplifying operating procedures, saving manpower, and improving production efficiency. At the same time, we will expand the industrial chain, establish professional cocoon collection stations, form one-stop services such as subsequent processing, and promote the upgrading and diversified development of the sericulture industry. According to the “branch + e-commerce + ecology + tourism” model, comprehensive online and offline sales of silk quilts, mulberry leaf tea, mulberry leaves, dried mulberries, mulberry wine, etc. are realized.
Song Zhou, a professor at the Party School of the Suqian Municipal Party Committee, believes that traditional industries such as sericulture must pay attention to changing the industrial chain, injecting modern elements, breaking the internal cycle pattern of traditional agriculture, and connecting low-end traditional industries with green, organic, and high-quality high-end modern industries. To meet demand, develop a complete industrial chain of primary, secondary and tertiary industries, promote the integrated development of three industries that support and interact with each other, realize the “rebirth” of the traditional sericulture industry, and enter the New Silk Road.
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