E-commerce fuels village reboot in Shanxi

A major agricultural area in the province, Hongtong prides itself on tasty, selenium-rich foods such as vinegar, walnuts, sweet potatoes, and Sichuan peppercorns.

"We used to sell our peppercorns at less than 80 yuan ($11.44) per kilo to buyers who came to our village to purchase them, but with proper packaging design, the price of our peppercorns sold through the station's livestreaming can reach 200 yuan ($28.6) per kilo," said Zhao Hulang, 60, a local of Xiayu village, where there's a 1,000-mu (666,667 square meter) Sichuan peppercorn cultivation base. Zhao's family has 20-mu farmland, and over the past five years, more has been set aside for growing peppercorns for their ballooning economic benefits.

"Now more than a quarter of our village's peppercorns are sold through livestreaming," Zhao said, adding that his family earned more than 100,000 yuan ($14,300) in 2019, almost 10 times as much as that five years back.

Zhao's family is not only the one that has benefited from the town's e-commerce station.

More than 20 tons of agricultural products from some 500 households have so far been sold through the e-commerce station, generating more than 120,000 yuan ($17,160) in sales. For the county's poor households, the station offers commission-free sales service and even purchases their produce such as wheat at a slightly higher price.

Aside from selling farmers' products at premium, the station has also been committed to popularizing quality seeds and hiring agronomists to train farmers to better their farming skills for higher production.

Furthermore, the station will partner up with a local vocational school to run courses on e-commerce skills for the county's younger people.

Dong Tiantain, 25, a female working as a clerk in the station, said she has recently signed up for a course on how to shoot and edit short videos for social platforms such as Douyin and Kuaishou.

"I feel very excited about it and I believe I can promote our products better after completing this course," Dong said.