The village is full of sweet aromas
In the southwest of "Paradise" Hangzhou, there is a small mountain village called Baima.
Although it belongs to Hangzhou, the small village is less elegant than Jiangnan.
Rolling mountains surround the small village, and the villagers dry the dried sweet potatoes in the courtyard, and the air is full of sweet smells.
Sweet potatoes are the main source of income for the Baima people, where every household grows sweet potatoes, with a planting area of more than 600 mu and an annual output of more than 4 million catties.
Every harvest season, the farmer's yard is piled up into a hill, and the field is full of people who planed the sweet potato.
Relying on the small sweet potato, the people of Baima Village in the mountain pass have lived a good life of living in buildings and cars.
Half a year's grain of sweet potatoes per season
The history of sweet potato cultivation in Baima Village can be traced back to the Qianlong period of the Qing Dynasty.
At that time, the Chinese population increased sharply, and the southern rice with a yield of only more than 300 catties per mu could no longer meet people's food needs.
The yield of sweet potatoes can reach 3,000 catties per mu, and planting sweet potatoes can greatly alleviate the food crisis.
Since then, Hakuba Village has begun the history of growing sweet potatoes.
The white horse is very suitable for the cultivation of sweet potatoes. The sandy soil is accompanied by the soil of the loess soil, nourished by the water at the source of Qiandao Lake, plus the temperature difference between day and night of five or six degrees.
Thanks to a series of environmental advantages, the sweet potatoes produced here are doubly sweet, with a sugar content of up to 27.7%, which is a sweetness that is difficult to achieve with sweet potatoes elsewhere.
As the saying goes, "a season of sweet potatoes half a year of grain", sweet potatoes can not only be fed, but also can be made into dried sweet potatoes that can be preserved for a long time.
Since then, the people of Baima Village no longer have to endure hunger.
The Qunfeng road is difficult to walk, and nine of the ten peasant households are poor
However, with the development of the times, in the mountain pass, the environment is closed and the traffic is inconvenient, which hinders the development of Baima Village.
"The road is difficult for Qunfeng to walk recklessly, and nine of the ten peasant families are poor." In the 1960s, Hakuba village had only one mountain road leading to the outside world.
This rugged mountain road is not accessible even by ox carriages. People need to get up early and go dark to go to the county town, and walk for a day and a night to arrive.
Until 1963, the Chun'an county government decided to open a road from outside the mountain to Baima Village.
However, in that era of lack of materials, there was no modern machinery, and the difficulty of building roads exceeded everyone's expectations.
The road passes through a small river, and the construction of the bridge foundation must first clean the silt at the bottom of the river.
It was a cold day, but the villagers did not hesitate and scrambled to jump into the cold river to clear the dredging.
The river is bone-chilling, can not soak for too long, everyone will buy liquor, drink one or two, increase the body temperature, go into the water to dry for an hour, and then change a group of people to continue to dry.
After four years and nine months, the people of Baima Village finally built a 17.79-kilometer winding road. Since then, mountain goods can go out, merchants can come in, and layers of mountains can no longer stop the footsteps of the White Horse people.
Not all sweet potatoes are suitable for dried sweet potatoes
After the road was built, in order to get rich, the people of Baima Village made a lot of explorations, sold moso bamboo, and engaged in oil tea, but they did not develop.
In the end, they returned to the sweet potato field that had solved the problem of food and clothing for them.
But the sweet potatoes can no longer be sold, so the people of Baima Village process the sweet potatoes into dried sweet potatoes and sell them.
Doing dried sweet potatoes, the people of Baima Village are professional, the drying methods are inherited for hundreds of years of old craftsmanship, and the usual children's snacks are all done in this way.
However, when I got to the market, I hit a wall.
The varieties they used at the beginning, the dried sweet potatoes they made had a general taste and were not popular. Later, the variety was changed, and the taste came up, but the color was too dark, the sales were not good, and there was no market.
It doesn't matter if it is not recognized, the people of Baima Village tried it over and over again, and finally found a variety suitable for making dried sweet potatoes, and sold the dried sweet potatoes to the county seat.
The brand road of dried sweet potatoes
The dried sweet potatoes were sold, and the road to prosperity of the people of Hakuba Village took another step forward, but new problems arose, and they could not sell for a good price.
In 2017, Zhu Zhijian, who was working outside the country, returned to his hometown to start a business, intending to make White Horse's sweet potatoes into an industry.
At that time, the dried sweet potatoes on the market had already sold for fifteen yuan a catty, but the dried sweet potatoes produced in Baima Village could only sell for seven or eight yuan a catty.
All are dried sweet potatoes, the taste of the white horse is not bad, the selling appearance is also very good, how can it not sell for a price.
It turns out that most of the dried sweet potatoes in Baima Village are made by farmers themselves, and the health is not guaranteed, and there is no brand, so it is difficult to walk in the market.
To this end, the town government helped to apply for the trademark of "Maple Ridge White Horse", and as long as there is a agricultural fair and agricultural exhibition in Zhejiang and nearby provinces, the people of Baima Village are also allowed to participate.
At the same time, in order to better manage the brand, the villagers not only purchased modern drying equipment, but also worked out standardized processes and product standards.
With the joint efforts of everyone, dried white horse sweet potatoes have gradually gained fame, not only the sales channels have been opened, but the price has also increased significantly.
Today, with the rise of tourism and the opening of roads, this small village in the mountains is more closely connected to the outside world. Every year, more than 600,000 catties of dried sweet potatoes are sold from Baima Village, and the per capita annual income of the villagers is more than 26,000 yuan.
Small sweet potatoes, just like this, became a big industry.
Tonight at 20:00, walk into the White Horse Village in the deep mountain pass to see how the little sweet potato paves the way to prosperity in the small mountain village.
"Remember Nostalgia" rural revitalization series
Broadcast content: "White Horse Village - Sweet Potato Fragrance in the Deep Mountain Pass"
Broadcast time: 20:00, Thursday, January 20, 2022
Broadcast channel: CCTV-4 Chinese international channel
Edit | Wang Linyan