Xinhua News Agency, Zhengzhou, December 12 Title: Towards Higher Quality Development -- Liu Zhuang's 40 Years of "Happiness Road"
Xinhua News Agency reporter Song Xiaodong
The appearance of Liuzhuang Village in Xinxiang County, Henan Province, taken on December 4. Photo by Zhu Xiang, Xinhua News Agency
The cold of northern Henan in winter is getting thicker, but walking into Liuzhuang is warm everywhere. This small village on the banks of the Yellow River in Xinxiang County, Henan Province, although there are only more than 1,000 mu of arable land and more than 1,800 people, every family in the village lives in a 4-story villa, the village is free of heating; free meat, milk, vegetables, fruits; children go to school for free; the village is responsible for the elderly, the villagers enjoy more than 50 benefits such as free medical care and free tourism; in 2017, the per capita disposable income of the whole village reached 37,000 yuan.
In the past 40 years of reform and opening up, Liu Zhuang has adhered to the "road of happiness" of collective economy and common prosperity, and has continuously moved towards higher quality development.
Poor Villages Become Rich Liu Zhuang people have done solid work
34 years ago, Zhang Chuanlan, who married Liu Zhuang from Lincun, ate meat for the first time when he was "not a year or a festival". "I heard about Liu Zhuangfu before, but I didn't expect that the days would be so good, a person five and a half pounds of meat, a day and a half of milk, living in a two-story small building, wearing a new cotton coat." Zhang Chuanlan sighed and said, "It's like a dream." ”
Liu Zhuang's good days are made with sweat.
Before the founding of New China, Liu Zhuang was very poor, and there was a saying circulating at that time: "In the ten miles of the township, the poorest belongs to Liu Zhuang." Lying next to the Yellow River's old road, Liu Zhuang suffered a lot. The land of the whole village has been cut into more than 750 pieces of broken land by four large ditches with a depth of 3 meters, which the locals call "hunkle heads", "saline depressions" and "toad nests", which are completely dependent on the harvest of the sky. By the time of the founding of the People's Republic of China, the yield of grain per mu was only about 50 kilograms, and the yield of cotton was only about 10 kilograms per mu.
In 1952, at the age of 21, Shi Laihe was elected secretary of the party branch of Liuzhuang Village, and the first thing he did was to lead the masses to transform the land. Under his leadership, the whole village of Liuzhuang, men, women and children, went into battle together, shoulder to shoulder, cart pull, people to carry, up posts to fill ditches, and lasha cover alkali. According to some statistics, Liu Zhuang people have moved more than 2 million earthworks, and if one side is lined up one after another, it can be arranged from Beijing to Guangzhou.
By the 1960s, Liuzhuang had achieved double high yields of grain and cotton, and had become one of the first advanced villages in the country to solve the problem of food and clothing. More than 700 pieces of broken land in Liuzhuang have also been successively turned into fertile fields that can be watered by drought and drained by waterlogging. Liu Zhuang people also dug canals in rivers, built bridges and gates, drilled derricks for electricity, hardened channels, and made field projects supporting, laying the foundation for stable agricultural production, high yield, high quality, and low cost.
On December 4, the staff worked at Liuzhuang Huaxing Pharmaceutical Factory in Xinxiang County, Henan Province. Most of the staff here are from Liuzhuang and the surrounding villagers. Photo by Zhu Xiang, Xinhua News Agency
Reform and opening up have plugged in the wings of take-off
Fill your stomach and live a better life. In the 1960s, Liu Zhuang set up a dairy farm; in the 1970s, Liu Zhuang opened a machinery factory to manufacture new agricultural tools and agricultural machinery accessories, and by 1978, the collective income of Liuzhuang Village had reached 1.26 million yuan, and the per capita collective distribution was 298 yuan, becoming the "richest village in the Central Plains".
In 1978, the Third Plenary Session of the Eleventh Central Committee of the Communist Party of China was exciting, but the villagers were still confused about how to take Liu Zhuang's road. Shi Laihe led the villagers to learn the spirit of the plenum for 3 years and connected with the reality of Liu Zhuang. Liu Junrong, who is 63 years old this year, still clearly remembers the scene when the whole village studied and discussed. "For 3 years, we studied the spirit of the Third Plenary Session every day, discussed what Liu Zhuang would do in the future, and we summed up the 165 words that guided Liu Zhuang's development from the communiqué, and everyone memorized it well, and now they can say it with their mouths open." Liu Junrong said.
Reform and opening up pointed out the direction for Liu Zhuang and also inserted wings for Liu Zhuang's take-off. At the beginning of 1982, Liu Zhuang carried out economic system reform and implemented the collective professional co-production contract responsibility system; in 1983, the collective income of the whole village reached 4.11 million yuan, double that of 1980; in 1985, Liu Zhuang saw the prospects of the inosine market and invested 15 million yuan to build Huaxing Pharmaceutical Factory, and a small village began to start high-tech biopharmaceuticals. In just 5 years, Huaxing Pharmaceutical Factory has developed 10 branches, producing dozens of APIs and finished drugs, and exporting more than half of the products.
By the time of Shi Laihe's death in 2003, Liu Zhuang's fixed assets had reached 990 million yuan, exports earned 34.78 million US dollars, and villagers had begun to enjoy more than 30 living benefits such as housing, schooling, medical care, and water.
"Reform and opening up have pointed out the road for Liu Zhuang, stimulated vitality, and made us more determined to develop the collective economy and take the road of common prosperity with differences, which is the strongest driving force for Liu Zhuang's development." Shi Shiling, who was once the party secretary of Liuzhuang Village, said.
Zhang Chuanlan, a villager in Liuzhuang County, Xinxiang County, Henan Province, took care of his grandson at his home on December 4. Photo by Zhu Xiang, Xinhua News Agency
Rural revitalization and then look at Liu Zhuang
Zhang Guizhong, a 61-year-old villager in Liuzhuang Village, works at Huaxing Pharmaceutical Factory, works during the day, goes home at night to take his grandchildren, and travels with his whole family on holidays. "I want to keep working, the village has brought us to a good life, and I also want to do more for the village and do more." Zhang Guizhong said.
"It is even more difficult to start a business, and if you want to keep a good job, you must innovate your business." Liu Mingxuan, the current party secretary of Liuzhuang Village, said. Entering the 21st century, Liu Zhuang began to transform to green development, and in 2004, he took the initiative to close the paper mill with an annual profit of tens of millions of yuan, and invested nearly 600 million yuan in environmental protection transformation.
In order to enhance the ability of innovation and development, since 2003, Liu Zhuang has "married" with more than 10 well-known scientific research units and universities such as the Institute of Microbiology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and established the Liu Zhuang Biomedical Technology Research Center to independently develop dozens of high-tech products. Now, Liuzhuang has become one of the largest production bases of inosine, antibiotics and vitamin APIs in China.
"Agriculture is the foundation of the countryside, and Liu Zhuang's development cannot be abandoned." Liu Mingxuan said. Since the 1980s, Liuzhuang's agricultural production has been mechanized and specialized, and in recent years, the degree of modernization has been continuously improved, and only 19 people need to operate and manage the 1,050 mu of arable land in the village, and the grain yield per mu is stable at more than 1,000 kg.
Imagining the future, Liu Mingxuan is full of confidence: "From flat land to improve grain and cotton production, to reform and opening up to develop the collective economy, Liu Zhuang has always been at the forefront of rural development, and today Liu Zhuang is still exploring the road of higher rural development, building beautiful villages and realizing rural revitalization. ”
On December 4, the staff worked at Liuzhuang Huaxing Pharmaceutical Factory in Xinxiang County, Henan Province. Most of the staff here are from Liuzhuang and the surrounding villagers. Photo by Zhu Xiang, Xinhua News Agency