In March, the land of Liyang is full of verdant, the tea trees in the mountains and hills are gradually awakening, and the tea garden bases have ushered in the spring tea mining season. On the mountains, tea pickers with small tea baskets on their shoulders and sunhats on their heads are scattered among the tea bushes. In the tea-making factory, the fragrance of tea is overflowing, and the young buds have completed the transformation from green tea to tea leaves, and tourists from all over the world come to smell the fragrance and look forward to tasting the first sip of new tea this year...... Liyang is prosperous with tea, and it is prosperous because of tea. In recent years, with the strong support of the local financial department, Tianmu Lake white tea has made efforts to new varieties and new technologies, and the green "small tea" has become a veritable "big tea industry" for enriching the local people.
Heavy variety, the old tea garden bursts with new vitality
At present, it is the peak season of tea picking, Xu Yuqin, director of the Jiangsu Province Modern Agriculture (Tea) Industry Technology System (Liyang) Promotion Demonstration Base, is busier than usual, and after sending away the old customers who came to buy white tea from Wuxi, he immediately rushed to the tea variety garden to record the latest growth of the newly cultivated tea seedlings in detail. As a national tea master, Xu Yuqin said frankly that although the tea industry has brought rich people and increased income for the local people, it is also facing the shortcomings of single product, short cycle, low utilization rate and weak competitiveness. In order to solve the bottleneck of industrial development, she focuses on cultivating and introducing new tea varieties, optimizing and adjusting the industrial structure, combining modern planting technology with traditional craftsmanship, and helping to enhance the value of the industry with scientific and technological strength.
Standing in front of the tea trees in the Liyang base, looking at the patches of new sprouts and dripping green, Xu Yuqin's face was full of relief. She introduced that this used to be a traditional green tea tea garden, due to the single variety, and the lack of necessary management and maintenance, the tea garden is aging, the average income per mu is only 3,000 yuan. In order to rejuvenate the old tea garden, after Xu Yuqin took over, he established a 300-acre high-standard clone compound ecological science and technology demonstration tea garden, created a 10-acre characteristic variety resource base, collected high-quality tea varieties from all over the country, eliminated green tea varieties with low economic benefits, and planted a large number of white teas with high economic benefits and suitable for local planting. After fine management, the yield of white tea per mu is about 25 catties, the average market price is 1,300 yuan/catty, and the price of some high-quality tea can reach 6,800 yuan/catty.
Xu Yuqin introduced that Jiangsu Province Modern Agriculture (Tea) Industry Technology System (Liyang) Promotion Demonstration Base is a tea science and technology enterprise in Liyang City, and is also the "leader" of the local tea industry. "In the past three years, the local financial department has given 300,000 yuan of special financial support for the construction project of modern agricultural industry technology system in Jiangsu Province every year, so that we can continue to promote more scientific and technological innovation and achievement transformation. Today, the base not only leads more than 300 surrounding farmers to develop a high-quality and efficient production base of more than 5,000 acres of characteristic Tianmu Lake white tea, but also innovates and establishes a regional albino tea technology exchange and cooperation mechanism in Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Anhui to promote the technological upgrading and development of the regional white tea industry.
In order to achieve the continuous output of new varieties, Liyang base has also established long-term industry-university-research cooperation with the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences and Southern Agricultural University, and has carried out experiments and innovations in the introduction of rare and characteristic tea varieties, breeding, and efficient tea cultivation technology, and has now formed five series of 40 varieties such as white tea fairy and red classic, especially the newly launched high-value purple tea, which has been sought after by the market as soon as it is on the market.
Heavy technology, traditional "production" to "wisdom" leap
In the past few days, with the blessing of continuous fine weather, the first batch of white tea of Liyang Tianmu Lake Yuzhi Special Tea Fruit Horticulture Co., Ltd. has been freshly baked. Walking into the company's new tea processing plant, the machine roared, and the fragrance of tea came to the nose. Compared with the busy and lively production scene of hundreds of tea pickers on the tea mountain, the tea processing workshop is a little deserted, and only a few workers perform their duties in the huge factory building, operating on the tea processing production line.
Pu Aiyu, who is almost ancient, stood in front of the digital and intelligent tea-making equipment, looking at the smooth running data on the big screen, and the corners of her mouth couldn't help but rise. Pu Aiyu, who has been dealing with tea all his life, is the general manager of Liyang Tianmu Lake Yuzhi Special Tea Fruit Horticulture Co., Ltd., and is proficient in everything about tea planting, tea picking, and tea making, and is a recognized "tea expert" in the circle. Why did the "master" who can make good tea with experience and feeling also use intelligent frying equipment?
Pu Aiyu said frankly that with the rapid development of the industry, the transformation of traditional agriculture to modern agriculture is becoming more and more imperative. For a long time, tea farmers have "relied on the sky to eat and watch the sky to be green". The weather not only determines the growth of tea trees, but also affects the processing and production of tea. At the same time, because the production and processing of famous and high-quality tea attaches great importance to the requirements of appearance and quality, in the case that continuous production can not meet the technical requirements of tea processing, it objectively causes a high dependence on labor in processing and other links. In the face of the new problems encountered by the old industry, Yuzhi took the lead in exploring the regional application of the Internet of Things in tea processing in Liyang, and cooperated with universities to develop new production equipment, which not only improved work efficiency and reduced labor costs, but also stabilized the quality of tea. Today, Yuzhi's intelligent production experience has been promoted throughout the country.
What makes Pu Aiyu feel very pleased is that in the process of exploring the regional application of the tea processing Internet of Things, the company is not alone, and the local financial departments at all levels have given strong support. "With the support of financial departments at all levels, we have obtained 2.5 million yuan of support funds, getting rid of the traditional and inefficient way of making tea by hand, and achieving quality and efficiency. Pu Aiyu pointed to the equipment in operation and proudly introduced that through equipment updates, this production line can calculate the best solution for temperature, humidity and time in each production process through big data analysis, and the white tea produced in this way has a stable taste and nutritional value, which is currently the leading industry in China.
Tian Chunhua, deputy director of the Liyang Municipal Finance Bureau, said that in order to promote the transformation and upgrading of the local tea industry, Liyang Finance has fully implemented various policies to support agriculture, vigorously supported the construction of tea garden infrastructure, and increased support for the tea industry through various financial support projects such as modern agricultural industry development, comprehensive agricultural development, and efficient facility agriculture, and supported tea gardens to carry out infrastructure construction such as road construction, plant transformation, processing equipment purchase, and sprinkler and drip irrigation installation, so as to improve the ability to resist natural disasters and comprehensive production capacity.
Heavy brand, polish the "golden signboard" of characteristic industries
In the process of white tea planting and development, Liyang has also learned the lesson that it is difficult to become bigger and stronger in the decentralized operation of agricultural products in other regions, and has integrated the advantageous resources of the white tea industry from the government level, and unified the trademark, packaging, production technology standards, quality grade standards, etc., which not only standardizes the production of white tea, but also avoids vicious internal competition.
This kind of "grouping" to do the industry and build a brand soon achieved good results. Up to now, the city's tea planting area is 72,000 mu, including nearly 50,000 mu of Tianmu Lake white tea, with more than 300 tea production and operation entities, with a total output of more than 1,300 tons of tea per year and an annual output value of 1.5 billion yuan. The tea industry has effectively driven farmers to get rich together, and has become the leading industry for rural revitalization, agricultural efficiency and farmers' income increase in Liyang. In 2022, Liyang was awarded the title of "Hometown of Characteristic White Tea" by the China Tea Circulation Association, and Tianmu Lake Town was awarded the title of "China (Tianmu Lake) White Tea Town". It can be said that the tea industry has really become a "golden signboard" that can be taken and shouted loudly in Liyang.
Speaking of the importance of brand, Pu Aiyu said frankly: "Brand is a powerful tool for tea operators to enhance market competitiveness. In order to enhance the brand value, the company will actively carry out technical cooperation with the Tea Research Institute of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Nanjing Agricultural University, Jiangsu Academy of Agricultural Sciences and other scientific research institutes, introduce and promote excellent varieties and advanced technology, and further improve product quality.
"We have always attached great importance to the creation of tea brands, and at present, the white tea industry in Tianmu Lake has formed a two-way cycle of 'strengthening the brand with excellent products and promoting quality with famous brands', and the scale of industrial clusters has been expanding, and the brand benefits have become increasingly prominent. Tian Chunhua introduced, in order to encourage enterprises to create tea brands, the local financial department has introduced encouraging policies, in the past three years, a total of nearly 28 million yuan has been invested to support the creation of tea and other high-quality agricultural products brand creation and new varieties, new technologies, new models and other cultivation and innovation. Today, there are more than 100 registered trademarks of Liyang tea, including 2 well-known trademarks in China, "Yulian" and "Yuzhi", 11 famous trademarks in Jiangsu Province such as "Tianjiashan" and "Fuzi", and 150 national and provincial brand awards. Especially in recent years, with the strong support of the local government, nearly 20 tea companies with certain market influence have jointly declared the "Tianmu Lake White Tea Cluster" as a provincial brand consumption cluster. As a true portrayal of the development of the tea industry, the hymn of "a leaf has made an industry and enriched the people" is continuing to be sung in the vast land of Liyang.
Jiangsu Economic News reporter Zhang Hanhong Zhu Mengdi
Correspondents: Chen Yundong, Pan Junhua
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