Chickens help farmers lifted above poverty line

Yang suffered from poliomyelitis as a child and is unable to do heavy physical work. Not able to find work outside the village, the 49-year-old had been surviving on his five mu land at home growing wheat and potatoes for years. Due to the high altitude, the yield in the hill region was low. Yang also had to pay the bills of his two children in university. Such a burden had made his family a typical poor household in the poverty-stricken village.

”Later, I saw that many villagers becoming rich by raising chickens. I wanted to join a cooperative and get rich, too. But I had no capital and no collateral, so I couldn’t get a loan. I really envied other people.”

However, in August 2015, Yang’s family finally benefited from a new policy. With the help of financial poverty relief, Yang not only joined a cooperative and bought some 800 baby onion flower chicks, and had the benefit of a 50 thousand yuan loan. He reckoned to generate extra income of 20 thousand yuan in 2015.

The Head of the Village Committee, Zan Xingjian, said: “Maying village is in a mountainous region that lacks water and where only a few crops can grow. The mountainous area is vast and the valley is deep. Infrastructure there is backward, and for generations the farmers were dependent on the weather to grow crops. They tended to live in poverty. On the plus side, however, there are no mines near the village and the area has zero pollution.

“There’s an abundance of wild garlic and onion flowers in Songduo Grassland. The free range chickens feed on those special resources, which make their meat delicious and low in fat. As the quality of people’s life in urban and rural areas improves, there will be a growing demand of green free range chickens.”

Zan himself realized the market potential early, and, in 2010, decided to develop free range chicken breeding as a key project in Maying Village. The Onion Flower Free Range Chicken Cooperative was then born. In recent years, the cooperative has helped many farmers become rich and able to breed chickens independently.

This has become a major means for farmers to become rich. In 2013, onion flower chickens received the Agro-Product Geographical Indication by the Ministry of Agriculture, and Maying Village won the title of a “One Village One Product demonstrative village”. However, poor villagers still could not improve their situation as they lacked capital to join the cooperative.

The biggest challenge facing the local government and the bank then was how to effectively utilize resources, teach farmers the skills rather than just give them money, and lift them out of poverty.

There was a large poverty-stricken population and great income disparity in Maying Village. In 2015, however, under the financial poverty alleviation guidance of the People’s Bank of China, Xining Branch, the rural commercial bank of the autonomous county of Huzhu developed a new method to extend credit to poverty-stricken households.

Relying on cooperative chicken breeding, the commercial bank established a poverty alleviation model of “specialized cooperative plus poverty-stricken household plus credit support”.

The model, relying on the specialized cooperative, chose from among the 68 registered poverty-stricken households those to be supported that could labor effectively, had a willingness and some ideas for self-development, a demonstratable development potential, income guarantee potential and a good record of abiding by the law.

Songduo Township Onion Flower Free Range Chicken Specialized Cooperative provided them with chicks, feed and training in raising techniques. The commercial bank extended credit to those households and issued them with “bless farmer” credit cards with a value between 10 to 50 thousand yuan. The households raised chickens with support from the cooperative and the bank, and the cooperative took charge of selling them.