Songyang: European olive oil shines in the southwest of Zhejiang

"Olive oil, made in Lishui" - this entrepreneurial idea that once seemed whimsical has become a reality in the oil olive base of Shanxiayang Village in Songyang County.

Songyang's association with European olive oil began in 2009. This year, Fu Yulou, an overseas Chinese in Qingtian, returned to his hometown with a planting and processing technical team and planted the first olive seedling in the mountains of southwest Zhejiang.

Eight years later, Songyang's 208-mu olive oil base squeezed out the first batch of olive oil in the province, filling the gap in Zhejiang's olive oil production.

This road to wealth creation, which began with a brilliant idea, seems to be destined to be full of unexpected "plots" - affected by many factors such as weather, this year's olive hanging fruit has dropped sharply, but also during this period, the provincial science and technology plan project supported by the Zhejiang Academy of Agricultural Sciences has arrived unexpectedly, and Songyang's olive planting base has successfully expanded outside the province.

In this challenge of intertwining "crisis" and "opportunity", "innovation breakthrough" has become a key way to break the situation.

Olive oil originating in the Mediterranean "moved" to southwest Zhejiang

In the context of the general lack of planting experience and technology in the province, Fu Yulou has embarked on the olive oil industry with the mentality of "daring to eat crabs" and has faced countless doubts.

"Although the olive cultivation industry is a cold industry in China, the market demand for olive oil has been very strong." Fu Yulou, who is now the head of Zhejiang Green Spring Agricultural Science and Technology Development Co., Ltd., told reporters that he had been doing business in many overseas countries for more than ten years, and in Spain, which is known as the "World Olive Oil Kingdom", he found that the locally grown olive oil was not only high in yield, good quality, but also very profitable, "but at that time, looking at The country, there were only a few large-scale olive planting bases." ”

Lishui has a superior ecological environment and great promise for the development of the olive oil industry - with such a simple idea, Fu Yulou began to try to introduce olive oil originating in the Mediterranean coastal countries to the deep mountains of southwest Zhejiang. However, the olive oil that adapts to growing in the Mediterranean climate is not accustomed to the new living environment, and fu Yulou's base in Longquan and Suichang will eventually appear due to problems such as excessive altitude and insufficient soil thinness, and a large number of olive leaves, dead fruits, and rotten roots have occurred one after another.

"Although the results are not ideal, we have accumulated a lot of planting experience." Fu Yulou and his team have full psychological preparation for "the gains and losses of the forerunners", and they are not discouraged, because "people do not live up to Qingshan, and Qingshan will certainly not live up to people".

During this period, Fu Yulou and his team partners have visited olive plantations in Toledo Province, Córdoba Province, Gansu, Sichuan and other places in Spain for many times to study planting techniques, and established cooperative relations with Zhu Shenlong, associate researcher of Zhejiang Academy of Agricultural Sciences. Since then, the scientific research team led by Zhu Shenlong has successfully selected As, Laixing, Piqili, etc. from more than 100 varieties of olive oil imported from abroad as the introduction varieties, and selected the Songyang Mountain Xiayang Village with suitable ecological conditions as the standardized planting base.

In the process of "foreign species" settling in Songyang, olive oil experts from Spain, Italy and other countries were also hired to come to Yamashita Yang Village to help solve problems such as soil improvement and "escort" the olives to take root in the local area.

After three years of cultivation and maintenance, more than 5,000 olive oil plants in the base have grown strongly, and in October 2017, the first batch of olive oil was successfully squeezed from the Yangcun Oil Olive Base in Shanxia.

Today, standing on the top of the hill overlooking the olive grove, it is full of turquoise. Fu Yulou pointed to the leafy olive trees and told reporters that the annual output of olive oil in the base has been 3 tons, "one kilogram of freshly squeezed olive oil, priced at 100 yuan." ”

Growing "golden fruit" of income increase on barren land

"From a sustainable perspective, this olive grove is a 'green bank' that benefits one party." According to Fu Yulou, olive oil is a perennial woody oil tree species, generally planted in the 3rd year before the sporadic fruit, the yield after that increases every year, to plant 25 olive trees per mu, the average fruit of the harvest period can exceed 50 kg, "just sell fresh fruit, you can achieve 'one mu of mountain ten thousand yuan'." ”

Not only that, but because olive trees are barren and drought tolerant, they can survive even if they are planted on barren mountains. In fact, the more than 200-acre base in Yamashita Yang Village was seven years ago a weedy and abandoned mountainous area.

"We are the happiest when olives are planted successfully." Local villagers told reporters that the base leases barren mountains at a price of 250 yuan per mu per year, and the rent rises by 50 yuan every five years, with a lease period of 30 years, "In addition to collecting rent at home, we can also work in the base every day to 'earn wages'." ”

But in previous years, such a harmonious scene could not be seen. Due to the large investment in the early stage, the long "empty window period" and the slow effect, the olive oil industry was once regarded as a "loss-making transaction" by the villagers, until the "Zhejiang Olive Oil First Pressing Ceremony" was successfully held in the Yefeng Olive Base in Yangcun, Shanxia in 2017, and the olive oil produced from the local area was not only sold throughout the country, but also achieved "global sales" through the Qingtian Qiao Xiang Agricultural Products City, and the attitude of the villagers was completely reversed.

As the olive oil industry shows more and more significant economic value, the villagers are increasingly enthusiastic about participating. Driven by the base, farmers in the surrounding villages compete to plant olive trees, as little as four or five acres, as many as more than ten acres, and the mature olive fruits are uniformly purchased by the base, and there is no worry about sales. The olive oil that spreads over the mountains not only brings good economic benefits to the enterprise, but also opens up an effective way for the villagers to increase their income and become rich.

"I reclaimed 12 acres of land to plant olive trees, and after 2 years I successfully set fruit, and this year's olive fruit production reached 1,000 kilograms." Wu Xinchun, a villager in Zhangxi Township, told reporters that he built this small-scale planting base on an abandoned quarry mountain, "The mountain conditions here are very poor, and the tea, citrus and other cash crops that I tried to grow in the past have not been able to survive, and I really can't imagine that the output value of olives can exceed 10,000 yuan now." ”

It is worth mentioning that the olive grove is also very suitable for raising sheep, geese and other livestock and poultry, "During the two-year 'empty window period' of the mountain to change to olives, I also made a lot of money by raising sheep, which did not have much impact on income." Wu Xinchun said with a smile.

Small olive oil carries the "dream of common prosperity" of rural revitalization

Although the busiest period of the year had passed, Fu Yulou had no time to rest. He is planning a more ambitious plan - to open up the road of scientific research and industrial cooperation, accelerate the progress of variety improvement, and further increase the output value of mu.

"Through demonstration radiation, the base has the ability to drive the surrounding farmers to common prosperity." After returning to China for more than ten years, the "original intention of fu yulou's team to create wealth" is constantly shining into reality.

Compared with the zero-based state of "not knowing what olive oil is" many years ago, the current planting team has mastered a lot of advanced technologies and means. This year, in response to the main olive tree species in the base, "the canopy is too large" and "the trunk is difficult to support nutrient delivery", technicians began to prune the branches under the guidance of experts, control the size of the canopy, and increase the density of dense planting, thereby reducing management and production costs. "The base is equipped with efficient water-saving irrigation equipment, which can carry out targeted scientific watering according to the soil moisture content of olive oil in different growth periods and different periods, so that daily management becomes more efficient and refined." Fu Yulou said.

At the same time, the sharp decrease in the amount of fruit hanging by the weather this year also made Fu Yulou realize that there is still a big gap in the research and development of planting technology and the application of practical technology.

"New industries should develop better and better, and scientific and technological innovation is the most powerful 'foreign aid'." Fu Yulou told reporters that the Zhejiang Academy of Agricultural Sciences recently sent "timely rain" - to carry out a three-year "oil olive industry support key technology research and demonstration" project research, "during this period, the Provincial Academy of Agricultural Sciences Crop and Nuclear Technology Utilization Institute will help us screen out excellent varieties suitable for Zhejiang's environmental conditions, crack the problem of the lack of good seeds, and explore the yield potential of Zhejiang olive oil in full fruit, providing a direct practical basis for research and summary of olive oil production benefits and development prospects." ”

In Fu Yulou's view, the "further digging" of the olive oil industry has just begun. In his vision, after two years, the base will plant 3 excellent varieties, their fresh fruit mu yield in the fruiting period will exceed 400 kilograms, fresh fruit oil content is not less than 14%, the squeezed olive oil can meet the "extra virgin olive oil" standard, "only by continuously breaking through the technical bottleneck and lowering the planting maintenance threshold, can local farmers really live a good life of common prosperity by planting olives." ”

Source: Lishui Daily Reporter Fu Mingyu Correspondent Wu Linlu Ye Mengyu

【Source: Lishui Daily】

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