Harvesting profits from leadership

Born into a local rural household, Qi is no stranger to poverty.

"My family couldn't even put together the tuition fee when I was admitted to college in 2004," she recalls.

"It was my fellow villagers who helped to scrape up the money," Qi says.

It has since given her a strong desire to give back to her hometown.

After graduating from the Inner Mongolia University of Science and Technology, Qi answered the country's call for college students to work in rural areas, a strategy to cultivate talent for new village development.

From 2009-13, Qi went door-to-door, inquiring about rural household needs or helping out in the farmlands, which had her better understand the villagers and rural conditions.

She was inspired to start up her business after visiting a vegetable greenhouse in Northeast China's Liaoning province.

It amazed her to see the thriving vegetables in the biting winter and how a local woman manages two to three greenhouses that produces 5,000-6,000 yuan worth of vegetables.

"It was great to see farmers make money even during the wintertime," she says.

After learning from experts, she took out a bank loan and rented two greenhouses in Ping'an village to grow strawberries in 2014.

It turned out to be an immediate success and brought her more than 80,000 yuan that year. An increasing number of visitors started to come and pick strawberries.

Qi was encouraged to reach out to a few other college graduates who had served rural areas in the region and they jointly established a cooperative in the business of planting various vegetables and fruits, which has been steadily expanding.

Once the cooperative was on track, Qi began pondering how to carry out her original dream of bringing prosperity to her fellow villagers.

In 2017, she proposed a "chicken-for-egg" cooperation model where a farmer receives at least 20 chicks for free from the cooperative and is expected to return 25 eggs per chick once they are grown.

After that, the chickens belong to them and they can sell all the subsequent eggs back to the cooperative.

Her plan worked as it managed to pique villagers' interest and get them on board. They all returned with the eggs as agreed and the cooperative sold the eggs at a profit, creating a win-win situation.

Encouraged by this success, Qi introduced other models like chicken-for-chicken, pig-for-meat and seedling-for-fruit, all of which have effectively increased the incomes of 80 impoverished households.

Wang Xilin, who fell into poverty due to an illness in his early years, regained hope for the future after opting into Qi's plan.

"She trusted me and gave me 50 chicks for free. I didn't have to pay for feed or vaccines," Wang says.

"After raising them, I returned five chickens and sold the remaining chickens for 120 yuan each, earning 5,400 yuan. I am truly grateful," Wang adds.

Qi says her goal has been continuously scaling up the agriculture-related business in the village and helping local villagers sell their agricultural and livestock products to larger markets at better prices.