Visitors experience making coffee at the Longyuan Coffee Estate
Chen Peng studied xinglong coffee making techniques
The coffee trees in the Xinglong Coffee Standardization Planting Demonstration Zone are growing happily
Witness the glorious Sun River Coffee Factory of Xinglong Coffee
A new product from Chia Tai Sun River Coffee Factory
In the 1960s and 1970s, with its unique flavor, Xinglong Coffee experienced a brief period of scenery, but soon took a sharp turn, with a series of "hard injuries" such as declining planting area, single product structure, uneven quality, and loss of brand value, so that Xinglong Coffee, which was once praised by Premier Zhou Enlai as "world-class", can only be attached to Hainan's tourism market, eating historical books, and "picking up customers" as tourism commodities.
"Revitalization" is imminent. At present, the Wanning Municipal Government regards Xinglong Coffee as one of the city's eight major industries to focus on building, through the establishment of planting demonstration areas, cooperation with large enterprises and other forms, trying to open up the upstream, middle and downstream "blocking points" of the industrial chain, and re-polish the "Xinglong Coffee" brand.
Boom coffee
Once a resounding Hainan business card
The affection of the people and the love of overseas Chinese are considered to be the unique cultural connotations of Xinglong Coffee.
Since the 1950s, returned overseas Chinese from 21 countries and regions have come to Xinglong Overseas Chinese Farms, and they have brought coffee planting technology, brewing technology and coffee drinking habits here, and gradually influenced the local people. Statistics show that there are now more than 200 large and small cafes in Xinglong, and drinking coffee has become a must for Xinglong people to do every day.
More than half a century has endured, and Xinglong Coffee must have its own superiority. Chen Peng, head of the coffee center base of the Institute of Spices and Beverages of the Chinese Academy of Tropical Agricultural Sciences and a coffee taster, introduced that compared with the small-grain Arabica in Yunnan, Xinglong is planted with a medium-grain Robusta, and the two varieties of coffee have a large difference in taste and aroma because of their different nutrient content.
With the cultivation of coffee drinking habits, the enthusiasm of Xinglong people for coffee is high, and the planting area is expanding year by year. In 1952, the first coffee factory in New China - Hainan Xinglong Huaqiao Farm Coffee Factory was established, and the "Sun River" brand Xinglong coffee produced by it was made of high-quality coffee beans from the Sun River, refined by southeast Asian elaborate recipes and roasting processes, and Xinglong coffee officially went to the market.
"Xinglong Coffee grew up under the care of party and state leaders." In Xinglong, no one denies this sentence, talking about the glory of Xinglong coffee, almost every Xinglong person wants to tell the story of Premier Zhou.
In 1960, Premier Zhou Enlai inspected Xinglong Farm. After drinking 3 cups of Xinglong coffee in a row, he said, "Xinglong coffee is world-class, I have drunk many foreign coffees, or our own coffee is delicious." Since then, Zhu De, Liu Shaoqi, Deng Xiaoping, Ye Jianying and many other party and state leaders have come to Xinglong, given a high evaluation to Xinglong coffee, and even presented it as a diplomatic gift to foreign guests.
Stuck in trouble
The planting area has been greatly reduced and the brand value has been lost
It can be said that Xinglong coffee is the "debut is the peak", but soon entered a low period, coffee planting area decline, brand value loss, product structure single, weak industrial base and a series of problems so that Xinglong coffee fell into the "can not go out" circle, to this day, these problems are still not effectively solved.
Data show that in the 1960s and 1970s, Xinglong's coffee planting area once reached 16,000 mu, and today, it is only more than 2,000 mu.
"The natural conditions of Xinglong are good, many cash crops can be planted, growers must choose higher prices, the price of coffee was not as good as rubber before, and now it is thrown by betel nuts, what do growers grow coffee?" Wu Chunguang, secretary general of the Xinglong Coffee Association, directly pointed out the root cause of the decline in coffee planting area.
Many industry insiders believe that the decline in coffee planting area is the key to a series of problems in the middle and lower reaches of the industrial chain. In order to benefit, the company purchased poor quality coffee beans from Southeast Asia, affixed the logo of "Xinglong Coffee", coupled with the simplification of traditional drinking techniques brought about by large-scale production, Xinglong Coffee lost its unique taste and lost its brand value year by year.
"Xinglong Coffee is not short of fame, but this brand has not done it." Zhao Deliang, general manager of Xinglong Coffee Valley, said that in addition to the problem of products, Xinglong Coffee has not formed a clear market positioning and development direction for many years. Wu Chunguang feels that the Xinglong coffee market is uneven, mainly because the industry has not formed a standardized unified management, so it is necessary to formulate a set of perfect judgment and evaluation methods, and it is necessary to divide the market level according to the coffee grade. Zhao Deliang holds the same view, "Xinglong locally grown coffee, less yield, high quality, can take the boutique route, the main high-end market, foreign coffee beans but using Xinglong traditional process processing coffee products, low cost, can be built as popular products." Zhao Deliang said.
The future can be expected
The "coffee estate" has taken a new approach
After finding out the "disease" of the development of the Xinglong coffee industry, the Wanning Municipal Government listed the coffee industry as one of the eight major industrial chains in the city, and broke through various problems in the upper, middle and lower reaches of the Xinglong coffee industry chain one by one. Expand the coffee planting area in the upstream of the industrial chain and improve the level of primary processing technology, improve the deep processing capacity of coffee in the middle of the industrial chain and the ability to develop and innovate new products and new applications, and increase the publicity and sales circulation of coffee products in the downstream of the industrial chain. Create a new model of manor coffee.
In a coffee plantation on the side of Xinglong Lianxing West Road, coffee is growing happily. This is the coffee standardized planting demonstration area established by Wanning to solve the problem of raw material supply in the upstream of the coffee industry chain, the planned area of the demonstration area is 4525 mu, and it is built in stages, and the first phase plans to plant 1026 mu of coffee, and the planting scale of 600 mu has been completed.
"The demonstration area adopts large-scale planting and high standards, one is to improve the quality of coffee and fresh fruits, the other is to solve the employment of farm workers, and more importantly, through the demonstration effect of the demonstration area, drive the enthusiasm of Xinglong growers to grow coffee and improve production." Qiu Xiaofeng, head of the demonstration area, said that the demonstration area plans to use three to five years to increase the scale of standardized Xinglong coffee plantations in the city. (Zhang Ye)
Source: New Hainan Client, Nanhai Net, Nanguo Metropolis Daily