【To the New Era and New World・ Agricultural Cultural Heritage】
Guangming Daily reporter Wang Meiying Yin Zehao
An agricultural cultural heritage site is a gene bank of biology, culture and technology. It is the concentrated embodiment of the survival philosophy of the ancients, carrying nostalgia, inheriting wisdom, and condensing the essence of agricultural civilization.
Nowadays, the protection of agricultural cultural heritage, the heavy responsibility of connecting the past and the future, falls on the shoulders of the post-80s and post-90s.
In 2022, the 20th anniversary of the Launch of the Globally Important Agricultural Cultural Heritage Initiative, three Chinese heritage sites - the Nomadic System of arukorqin Grassland in Inner Mongolia, the Tieguanyin Tea Culture System in Anxi, Fujian, and the Dry-land Shiyan Terrace System in Xiangxian County, Hebei Province, were officially recognized by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations as Globally Important Agricultural Cultural Heritage. So far, China's globally important agricultural cultural heritage has increased to 18, ranking first in the world.
The story of the millennium heritage "protected in excavation and passed on in use" has since been recorded and continued to be written by the younger generation, next to the terraces, in the grasslands, in the tea plantations...
Scenery of Hebei County. Courtesy of respondents
Create a "seed bank" that belongs to the terraced people
In early autumn, deep in the Taihang Mountains, terraces wind from the foot of the mountain to the top of the mountain, and large fields of corn and millet are waiting to be harvested, and this piece of brilliant golden yellow contrasts with the blue of the sky, the green of the trees, and the red of the leaves.
Located in the depths of the Taihang Mountains, the stone is thick and thin, the mountain slope is steep, the drought and little rainfall, but since the Yuan Dynasty, the locals have chiseled the stone weir from generation to generation, leaving behind the Taihang Shiyan Terraces with a total area of 41,500 mu so far. As early as 1990, the dry-land Shiyan terrace system in Xiangxian County, Hebei Province, was called "a major wonder of the world" and "the second Great Wall of China" by experts from the United Nations World Food Programme.
Wang Haifei is a post-80s agronomist in the Agricultural and Rural Bureau of Xiangxian County, mainly engaged in field investigation, protection and breeding of seeds and field planting identification. "I grew up in the countryside of Xiangxian County, and I have a special affection for these 'old varieties.'" However, the seeds of the old varieties are not sold in the agricultural material stores, and can only be found in the homes of some farmers.
Every year on the second day of the second month of the lunar calendar, "the dragon looks up", the people of the county will make a traditional snack "dragon egg". Authentic "dragon eggs" are made with glutinous millet noodles with yellow and black shells. In the past, the glutinous millet varieties had yellow and black skulls, and later there were red skulls, and their taste was obviously different. Yellow and black shells of glutinous millet have become rare, in order to find these seeds, Wang Haifei searched for many years, and finally found them in Wang Jinzhuang, and put them in the "seed bank".
In 2019, Wang Haifei found a traditional farm soybean variety in a villager's home that was known locally as "little white bean" and he had never seen it before. He excitedly planted the "little white beans" into the ground, but there were no seedlings for two consecutive years. "I thought I wouldn't cut off the seeds until I finally planted them this year, and I was relieved." Wang Haifei recalled, "Seeds are the chips of agriculture, and the collection and breeding of traditional farmhouse varieties are of great significance to protecting the biodiversity of the terrace system and ensuring national food security." ”
Since 2018, the systematic survey of old varieties of crops in dry-land Shiyan terraces in the county has been fully rolled out, and 171 old varieties have been protected, of which more than 40 are beans. Each variety is not easy to come by, and it is the staff who go door to door and visit more than 1,000 farmers before collecting and sorting it out.
He Huanzhu picks tea leaves in the Anxi Tieguanyin Ecological Tea Garden. Courtesy of respondents
"Wang Jinzhuang Farmer Seed Bank" is the first community-level "seed bank" in the north, and it is very rare to be able to collect 171 varieties. "The 'old varieties' have allowed generations of terraced people to survive the famine years, and the villagers are reluctant to throw away these seeds, they carry too many memories of the terraced people, and to this day, they still retain that inseparable feelings for these old varieties." Our job is to make these seeds, which have been passed down for thousands of years, still pass on today's agricultural modernization. Wang Haifei said.
Agricultural cultural heritage is rich and three-dimensional, and it is not only seeds that need to be passed on. From the farming technology of "hiding grain in the ground", the storage technology of "storing grain in the warehouse", the survival technique of "saving grain in the mouth" and the agricultural ecological wisdom of the unity of heaven and man, to the special customs of "planting a hundred kinds of land and not relying on the sky" and other special customs such as "planting a hundred things in the land and not relying on the sky", and giving the donkey a birthday on the winter solstice day... Behind the magnificent agricultural landscape of the Shiyan Terraces, it not only carries a large number of species resources, but also condenses the essence accumulated by agricultural civilization for thousands of years. Under the leadership of Wang Haifei's master and senior agronomist He Xianlin, the Agriculture and Rural Affairs Bureau of Xiangxian County organized and compiled a series of books on the dry farming terrace system in Xiangxian County - "Wisdom of Ti Geng", "Ti Xiu Tai Xing" and "Ti Xiang Zhen Feng".
Nowadays, Wang Haifei's work plan is to select the traditional farmhouse varieties with good taste and high yield in the "seed bank" for large-scale planting and develop characteristic terraced agricultural products. In his view, the challenges faced by the terraced people in the new era may be much more arduous than those of their predecessors.
Integrate traditional nomadic culture into the contemporary era
In the Arukorqin Grassland in Inner Mongolia, cattle and sheep can enjoy more than 300 kinds of edible grass species and drink clear river water. Some herders still adhere to the ancient traditional nomadic customs, living in the water and grass, eating meat and drinking cheese.
It is also on this grassland that young people use modern concepts and methods to carefully care for the water and soil they cherish.
On the way to migrate, the calves rest on the Chagan Dam in the Tallinn Flower Grassland of Arukorqin Banner. Courtesy of respondents
The post-90s youth Ao Ri Gele is such a young man, in Aru Korqin Banner Bayan Wendur Sumu and Rimu Gacha, he carefully runs the animal husbandry cooperative, and together with the people of the cooperative, the ancient nomadic life is integrated into the contemporary era.
The "label" of nomadic culture contains business opportunities, and cooperatives that once operated difficulties not only opened up the market in Hohhot with the efforts of Ao Ri Gele, but also sold their products to Beijing and Tianjin.
"I grew up in a herd of cattle and sheep, and I have a deep affection for pastoral areas." The professional knowledge and skills of food science learned by Ao Ri Gele are exactly what is particularly needed for the development of cooperatives.
The cooperative set up the Sudemaraqin Animal Husbandry Service Company to carry out socialization services in the jurisdiction to provide epidemic prevention, deworming, disinfection and improved breeding for livestock raised by herders. Ao Ri Gele introduced: "The Mongolian word 'SudeMalaqin' means 'excellent shepherd', and now it has undertaken the epidemic prevention work of nearly half of the livestock in the surrounding 23 villages. ”
In mid-autumn, the cooperative members and herders who had experienced four months of summer camp life set out one after another, singing grassland pastoral songs, and after three or four days of travel, they returned to the winter camp and began to prepare winter forage for cattle, sheep and horses.
In the long-distance migration of grassland nomads, "grazing + grassland base" has replaced simple grazing, and the income and quality of life of herders, the ability to cope with extreme disasters, and the yield of livestock products have increased. However, the nomadic way of "living by water and grass" remains the same, and the core elements of agricultural cultural heritage have not changed.
Driven by modernization, the ancient nomadic culture has also undergone new changes. The traditional way of storing hay is prone to mold and deterioration, which has always bothered herders. In 2019, Ao Rigle discovered the technology of processing hay while studying abroad and introduced machines. "The natural forage granules that have been professionally processed and produced effectively avoid the waste of forage caused by wind and sand and rain and the loss of nutrients caused by wind and sun. The small size of the granular feed makes it more suitable for long-term indoor storage. Ao Rigle said that later the cooperative introduced a large machine, and the problem of storing a large amount of hay in the winter camp was finally solved.
The Arukorqin Steppe Nomadic System is the only steppe nomadic system with Mongolian characteristics in the world, with rich cultural diversity and biodiversity, and is a typical model for sustainable nomadic pastoralism in the world. Aurigle is proud of this.
Inner Mongolia Arukorqin Banner Tallinn flower grassland scenery. Profile picture
The civilization in a leaf speaks at home and abroad
In autumn, the tea plantations in Anxi, Fujian Province, are still green. The tea picker carries a bamboo basket on his back and shuttles between the tea ridges, his fingers jumping at the tip of the tea tree. Under the tea garden, the roof of the farmer's building is covered with tea green. The mountains are fragrant and everyone is happy.
Anxi County has a history of more than 1,000 years of tea cultivation, and Tieguanyin was found here 300 years ago and named. In the long-term process of tea planting and tea making by tea farmers, Anxi has gradually formed a composite agricultural system with the selection, cultivation, pest control, ecosystem management of tea gardens, tea picking technology and tea related culture as the core elements. As early as the Song and Yuan Dynasties, Anxi tea went to the world as an important commodity through the "Maritime Silk Road" and became an important Chinese symbol.
There is a 1977 Tea Cloud Story Hall in Yangkeng Village, Longmen Town, Anxi County, and He Huanzhu, the "FuCha Girl" after the 80s, is the chief person. She also has an important identity - the representative inheritor of the Anxi Oolong Tea (Tieguanyin) production technique. Born in a family of tea industry, He Huanzhu told tourists that his non-genetic inheritance work stemmed from feelings.
Hundreds of thousands of women in Anxi County are engaged in tea industry-related work, including growing tea, making tea, selling tea, and speaking tea. But He Huanzhu observed that the tea masters in Anxi were basically male.
Many Anxi locals are reluctant to let women engage in the tea industry, because tea making is hard, and they need to do some hard work and dangerous work, for example, artificial green shaking, machine kneading, machine frying and other links rarely involve women. In order to allow women to get more learning and work opportunities, in March 2019, the Anxi Tea College of Fujian Agriculture and Forestry University, the Anxi County Women's Federation and other units established the "Anxi Tieguanyin Female Tea Teacher Non-genetic Learning Institute", which trained a batch of female tea masters who inherited the anxi Tieguanyin intangible cultural heritage in a full cycle.
As an off-campus practice tutor of Anxi Tea College of Fujian Agriculture and Forestry University, He Huanzhu, together with some female tea teachers, participated in the declaration of the Globally Important Agricultural Cultural Heritage of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations by the Anxi Tieguanyin Tea Culture System, and served as a defense expert to help the Anxi Tieguanyin Tea Culture System declare the globally important agricultural cultural heritage.
At present, three tea culture systems in the mainland have been listed as globally important agricultural cultural heritage, showing China's long and rich tea culture. "The most important feature of agricultural cultural heritage is that it is integrated with the production and life of the people." In He Huanzhu's view, the new type of tea consumption has attracted many young consumers, and the rapid growth of e-commerce and live broadcast platforms has also brought new opportunities for the spread of tea culture and the development of the tea industry.
"With the popularity of tea and the rise of tea culture, more and more young people are engaged in the tea industry, and the post-80s and post-90s have become the main force in the spread of tea culture, and there is no shortage of young people in this industry." He Huanzhu is full of confidence in the cause, "In the future, the team will continue to explore the integration of female strength and intangible cultural heritage into the Tieguanyin tea culture system, just as hundreds of years ago, tell the story of a leaf overseas, and permanently retain the fragrance of a leaf and the cultural foundation behind it in the land where it grows." ”
(Support for this issue: Chen Chen)
Guangming Daily ( 2022.09.13 12 edition)
Source: Guangming Network - Guangming Daily