Zhuang Kunping, chairman of Singapore Weichi Food Group, is the first industry leader to introduce cereal to the Chinese market and enjoys the reputation of "the father of Chinese cereal".
When my parents boarded a ship from Shantou to Nanyang, they were empty-handed and only carried a large bath towel.
My mother said that there was nothing at that time, and she only took a large bath towel to Go to Nanyang
Zhuang Kunping, Chairman of Singapore Weichi Food Group
Known as the "father of Chinese cereal", the Malaysian tide merchant Zhuang Kunping, the chairman of Singapore Wei Chi Food Group, the former founder of Singapore Jinwei Group, is his first industry leader to introduce cereal to the Chinese market.
In 1993, Jinwei Group invested in the construction of two comprehensive industrial buildings, and founded Shantou Jinwei Food Industry Co., Ltd. on this basis. Since then, the "Golden Taste" 3-in-1 series of nutritious cereals have entered the homes of ordinary people.
As a nutrient-rich cereal food, oatmeal has become one of the most important breakfast foods because of its comprehensive and balanced nutritional composition, and the consumer demand in the breakfast market has gradually increased. Some institutions predict that the annual sales volume of ready-to-eat cereal in China in 2018 was 41,000 tons, and it is expected to increase to 56,000 tons by 2022, with a compound annual growth rate of 8%, and China's oatmeal consumption market is in a continuous expansion trend.
Let's take a look at the legendary story of the Zhuang Kunping family, the "father of Chinese cereal"!
Guolong Village, Liaoyuan Town, Puning City, Guangdong Province
Zhuang Kunping, born in July 1944 in Penang, Malaysia, is from Guolong Village, Liaoyuan Town, Puning City, Guangdong Province, and is a fellow countryman with Mr. Zhuang Shiping, a famous overseas Chinese leader.
The old people of Puning have an old saying: "One pretty Hongyang Fang, two pretty fruit Longzhuang." "What do you mean?" It is said that the fang and Zhuang surnames of Puning have an exclusive trend in the Puning area, and many influential figures have emerged.
Zhuang Kunping's hometown of Guolong Village is a famous overseas Chinese township in chaoshan area, one of the chaoshan zhuang clan settlements, the hometown of Zhuang Shiping, a well-known figure in Hong Kong, and former vice chairman of the All-China Federation of Returned Overseas Chinese. There are more than 20,000 people living in the village, while there are more than 80,000 overseas Chinese living in Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan, of which overseas Chinese dependants account for 80% of the total number of households in the village.
At the end of the Qing Dynasty and the Republic of China period, due to the long-term state of war and chaos in old China, coupled with natural and man-made disasters, the people along the southeast coast such as southern Fujian and Chaoshan were not happy, and many people could not even maintain a minimum livelihood.
"Trees die, people live." In order to support their families, some Chaoshan people were forced to leave their homeland and make a living in sampans and go to Nanyang. Where there is room for survival, there are Chaoshan people. They are diligent and hardworking, willing to do any job, coupled with flexible minds, business acumen, many people in foreign countries, with their own industrious hands to change their fate, Zhuang Kunping family is such a typical representative.
Guolong residence and ancestral hall building
Guolong Village, is currently the largest village with the surname Zhuang in the country, the ancestor of the Zhaoji clan of Guolongzhuang, is the second son of Zhuang Gongcong, the ancestor of Chao'an Zhuang, the character Mu Geng, also known as Qingsu.
Zhuang Qingsu was born as a bachelor, and song Zhenghe was promoted to missionary lang four years later. In order to avoid the rebellion of the Yuan soldiers, Zhuang Qingsu and his young son Zhuang Chunjing (Wu Bao) moved from Chao'an Zhuanglong to Guolong Village, Chaoyang County. (Note, this area was later assigned to Puning)
In his twilight years, Zhuang Qingsu fell ill and died in the Chen family, and before he died, he entrusted his youngest son Zhuang Chunjing (Wu Feeding) to the foreign family of Chen Po, and left a suicide note with Wu Nursing growing into the basis of the return to the sect. Words: "Nian Wu feeds my child, Lai Chen Po Ti lifts up, with the ruler of the land, with some fields and sacrifices." Although he died in the village, his soul is still with Longxi. Having grown up and returned to the Sect, may the words of Si be not abandoned. ”
During the reign of the Yuan Dynasty, disasters arose in the Chaoshan area, and Zhuang Chunjing himself and his five generations of descendants were all surnamed Chen; until the Ming Dynasty (1488-1505), the sixth generation of Sun Nanxi began to restore the Zhuang surname. At this point, the six generations of Sun Zhuang Nanxi and Zhuang Daping, who followed the original Fuzong and revived the ancestral industry, called it the ancestor of the Guolong Zhuang clan Zaiji I.
By the light years of the Qing Dynasty, Zhuang Qifeng (Note: 1808-1889) of Guolong was listed as a martial artist, and Zhuang Qifeng had six sons, except for his sixth son Zhuang Guoming, who died early, and the fifth son, Quan Dengke, produced four jinshi in 55 years. Zhuang Qifeng's "one door four soldiers, six sons and five Dengke", was passed down as a good story by the local people and has been praised to this day.
Incidentally, Chaoshan and Fujian have deep historical roots, and Zhuang Qingsu, the ancestor of the Guolong Zhuang clan, is the fourteenth generation grandson of Zhuang Sen, the ancestor of the Fujian Zhuang clan.
Zhuang Sen, originally from Gushi, Gwangju, Henan, in the last years of the Tang Dynasty, followed his uncle Wang Chao, Wang Zhenzhi into Fujian, and the tired official Guangzhou Thorn History, after disarming and returning to the field, chose to live in Yongchun Taoyuanli (now Huyang Town, Yongchun County, Fujian Province), so it is also called "Taoyuan YanPai", Zhuang Sen is also the founding father of the Zhuang clan in minnan. According to incomplete statistics, the descendants of the Zhuang clan originating from Yongchun Taoyuan have lived in Fujian, Guangdong, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Qiong, Hong Kong, Taiwan and other provinces and regions, including those living overseas, with a total number of nearly one million, which can be called the Sheng ethnic group.
Penang, Malaysia
Zhuang Kunping, a "second generation of overseas Chinese", was born in Penang, Malaysia, and in the 1930s, his parents chose to cross the ocean and go to Nanyang to make a living. Zhuang Kunping said that his parents boarded the ship in Shantou almost empty-handed, "I heard my mother say that they had nothing at that time, only a large bath towel and went to Nanyang." ”
After boarding a ship from Shantou and wafting and floating on the sea for nearly two months, my parents arrived in Penang, Malaysia; what we usually call Penang is made up of two parts: Penang Island (Penang) and North Walesawa. Penang, once the trading base of the British East India Company, has a century of maritime and trade history. Among them, Penang Island guards the northern mouth of the Strait of Malacca, across the sea from the Malay Peninsula, and the whole island is lush and green, known as the "emerald of the Indian Ocean"; and the Uighur District has a wide grassland.
In Penang, Zhuang Kunping's parents, together with some Chaoshan villagers, engaged in farming, and in 1944, Zhuang Kunping was born. Zhuang Kunping recalled that when he was a child, he said that his family worked hard every day, planting vegetables and selling vegetables; he himself often followed his sister to carry water and grow vegetables when he was seven or eight years old, and did not enter school until he was 9 years old. Zhuang Kunping said: "I still remember my father riding a 28-inch cart day after day, carrying his own harvested vegetables to the market, sweating and thin figures." ”
By the age of 17, Chuang Kun Ping left the countryside for the Malaysian state of Kedah to live a half-work and half-school life; he worked during the day and went to school at night to study secondary school courses, tutoring Chinese. At that time, Zhuang Kunping had a meager income of 30 yuan per month, not only successfully completed his studies, but also accumulated a certain amount of capital for his future entrepreneurship.
Zhuang Kunping, "Father of Chinese Cereal": I am a descendant of Yan huang
Zhuang Kunping participated in the flame relay in Shantou
"I am a descendant of Yan Huang, and Beijing's hosting of the Olympic Games is the glory of overseas Chinese." Zhuang Kunping, who loves sports, said.
On May 10, 2008, the Olympic Torch Relay was held in Shantou City, and three torchbearers, Chen Hanshi, Wu Zhexin and Zhuang Kunping, who were well-known overseas ethnic groups, participated in the torch relay. Zhuang Kunping said happily as a torchbearer for the Beijing Olympic Flame Relay Shantou Station: I did not expect that as a foreign Chinese, I could pass on the holy flame and the Olympic spirit in the motherland, which is the most memorable event in my life.
It started with ready-to-eat oats on a trip. In 1987, Zhuang Kunping, who runs a small shop in the Malaysian town of Patong, traveled to South Korea. At that time, when the "Four Little Tigers" in Asia were developing economically, he found that the pace of people's lives was also accelerating, especially "fast food" and "fast food culture" were very popular in South Korea. At that time, South Korea had begun to have "three-in-one" food, that is, "instant punch, instant solution, ready to drink" food.
Therefore, Zhuang Kunping tried to import a batch of "three-in-one" instant coffee from South Korea and sold it in his own store in Malaysia, but he did not expect that the business was super booming and popular. So he and a friend surnamed Qiu rented an old factory in Telford Lane, Singapore, invested S$300,000, and opened a food workshop called "Jinwei". In 1990, he opened a second production plant in Malaysia.
In the early days, the Zhuang Kunping factory mainly produced "three-in-one" instant coffee, and after being put on the market, it was welcomed by local people due to its adaptation to the fast-paced life in Singapore. Three years later, when he relocated the headquarters of the Golden Flavor Group, the predecessor of Singapore Flavor Group, to Singapore, the food produced by "Golden Flavor" at that time occupied more than 80% of the market share of instant food products in Singapore and Malaysia.
Later, the "golden taste" products slowly evolved from a single "three-in-one" coffee to a series of products such as "three-in-one" tea and cereal. Among them, in 1988, he founded two major food brands in Malaysia, "Golden Coffee" and "Cafe21".
The "golden flavor" food of the Zhuang Kunping family
In 1991, "Golden Flavor" food entered the Chinese market, Zhuang Kunping founded Oriental Confectionery Food Co., Ltd. in Shantou, and established a domestic production headquarters. In 1995, he invested more than 50 million yuan to build Shantou Oriental Packaging Industry Co., Ltd., and in 1997 invested 2 million US dollars to introduce a wafer cake production line to Shantou; in 2000, the group acquired 49 acres of land in Shantou to build a Jinwei complex building.
Zhuang Kunping later recalled that it took him only two days to decide to invest in Shantou.
In an early interview, Zhuang Kunping said: "Although I am the second generation of Teochew Chinese who have emigrated to Malaysia, frankly, I have never returned to my motherland before 1990. However, I am also a descendant of Yan Huang, and I have the blood of Chinese flowing through my body. Although our family lives in Malaysia, we are always concerned about the reform and development of the motherland. In 1990, I returned to my homeland for the first time. ”
At that time, China's cereal fast food market, which was dominated by oatmeal, was still in a "blank" state, and Zhuang Kunping was also worried about his own products. So he will bring some samples to some hotel staff to try and listen to feedback.
Shantou Jinwei Group
In the early 1990s, Shantou, which was already a special economic zone, was in the midst of rapid development.
Zhuang Kunping, who returned to his hometown in Chaoshan Province, chose to invest in Shantou on the one hand, because of his hometown complex, on the other hand, he was deeply impressed by the rapid development of Shantou; in just 2 days, he decided to set up the "Golden Taste" China headquarters in Shantou and signed a contract with relevant parties.
Zhuang Kunping, who has a successful career, does not forget to give back wealth to the society, and has donated funds to build a number of hope primary schools such as Jiexi Jinwei Hope Primary School, and donated funds to hold many public welfare activities. All along, he believes that investing in China, especially in Chaoshan Province, is a leap forward for his family business. He always said that the development of the motherland is really too fast, "I am proud of my motherland from the bottom of my heart!" ”
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