Cultivating Vanishing Glutinous Rice in the Sichuan Hills

◉At 11 am on 18 July, the protagonist of this piece, Sun Wenxiang, will join two other guests at the Chengdu Lifestyle Market to discuss heirloom varieties and ecological agriculture. Readers unable to attend in person can reserve a place on the live stream.

Farmer Sun Wenxiang stood barefoot in the concrete courtyard to greet us, his feet broad and weathered.

It was early July in Hongya County, Meishan City, Sichuan Province, and a series of heavy downpours had just moved through. These marked a rare few days of respite from the seasonal workload. In half a month’s time, the maize in Sun Wenxiang’s fields would be ready for the harvest.

Since 2013, Sun Wenxiang has worked alongside his wife and father to transform 16 mu of family land in Qilong Village, Dongyue Town, Hongya County, into an ecological farm. They have safeguarded the heirloom seeds of more than 12 rice varieties, including the local traditional strain ‘Red-beak Glutinous Rice’ – a rare cultivar featured in the Slow Food Ark of Taste. Sun Wenxiang is also profiled as a guardian of traditional rice varieties in the book *Vanishing Food*.

I. The Vanishing Rice

Qilong Village is nestled in a hilly region. As the car winds its way up the mountain, the view from the windows is dominated by dense stands of bitter and ruler bamboo. Villagers cultivate golden tea, maize, and rice on these fragmented plots. Yet most farmers from the surrounding villages have left to seek work elsewhere. “A month’s wages buy far more rice than you could grow yourself,” they often say. Moreover, local authorities have consolidated and leased out many of these plots for large-scale farming under the “Hundred-Mu Fields” initiative.

In late 2023, a Chinese translation of *The Food That Vanishes*, a work on agricultural biodiversity, was published. Its author, British BBC Radio food correspondent Dan Saladino, has travelled the globe documenting thirty-four crops teetering on the brink of extinction, yet preserved by dedicated farmers. The farmer interviewed for the chapter on rice is none other than Sun Wenxiang.

The chapter traces the history of cultivated rice worldwide and charts the loss of wild rice diversity since the 1960s. It cites how the International Rice Research Institute developed a high-yielding, pest-resistant ‘IR8’ variety that rapidly spread across Asia, leading farmers to abandon local landraces in its favour. As the book notes, Hunan Province alone boasted over 1,300 distinct rice varieties in the 1950s; by 2014, that figure had dwindled to just eighty-four.

The ‘Red Mouth’ glutinous rice cultivated by Sun bears a distinct reddish speck on each grain—the “red mouth” that gives it its name. According to *The Food That Vanishes*, wild rice is naturally red, and red rice packs a richer nutritional profile than its white counterpart. However, because paler grains are easier to rinse and cook, selective cultivation practices gradually shifted the crop’s colour. The variety boasts an “unforgettable” flavour and a characteristically soft, glutinous texture. Its distinct stickiness, in fact, stems from a natural genetic mutation.

◉ BBC journalist Dan Saladino interviewed Sun Wenxiang at his farm in Hongya, Sichuan, and featured his story alongside the red-beaked glutinous rice in *Vanishing Foods*. Photo credit: Sun Wenxiang

Unlike the short, stocky hybrid rice varieties, red-beaked glutinous rice plants can grow up to 1.5 metres tall. This greater height makes them far more susceptible to lodging. To keep the root systems anchored, growers must drain the paddies every May once the rice heads begin to form. But in 2020, a powerful typhoon swept through, and overnight, every stalk of Sun Wenxiang’s glutinous rice was blown flat. The grains were submerged and began to sprout, compromising their flavour and rendering them unsellable. “Farming is, after all, at the mercy of the weather,” Sun Wenxiang remarks. Rather than regret his choice, he simply returned to selecting and saving seeds, ready to sow them again the following year.

Alongside the red-beaked glutinous rice, Sun Wenxiang’s fields are home to several other cultivars, including Ma Guzi, Simiao, Hong Guzi, Bama Gu Zhenxiang, and the Guiyou 6, 7, and 8 series. He also grows heritage varieties of glutinous corn, yellow corn, Job’s tears, potatoes, pumpkins, and black beans, with seeds sourced from fellow farmers and agricultural professors across the region. He took special care to draw our attention to an old plum tree—a local variety that has stood on the land since his childhood. Its fruit is a clear, bright yellow, about the size of a pigeon’s egg, and offers a rich, complex balance of sweet and tart.

◉ By early July, the red-beaked glutinous rice in Sun Wenxiang’s fields has already begun to set heads.

II. Discovering Ecological Farming

Before returning home to farm, Sun Wenxiang had always been a bit of a “local boss”. During the People’s Commune era, he served as a labour points clerk for his production brigade, later becoming an accountant and then village brigade head for a decade. He subsequently worked on construction projects before being placed in a mining company, where he rose from safety officer to mine manager.

In 2013, by chance, Sun Wenxiang came across a grassroots group: the Chengdu River Research Association. The organisation was founded following the 1997 rehabilitation project of Chengdu’s Fu River. Agricultural runoff—pesticides, fertilisers, and livestock waste—had been identified as a primary driver of river ecosystem degradation. Since rivers flow through both villages and cities, protecting them requires participation from both ends. Consequently, the association began supporting upstream rural households in adopting ecological farming to cut agricultural pollution, while simultaneously mobilising urban consumers through group-buying schemes and farmers’ markets to secure reliable sales for growers. (See Foodthink: *No Clean Rivers, No Safe Food*)

A relative of Sun Wenxiang happened to be volunteering with the association and invited him to Chengdu for a training course. “He asked me, ‘Would you fancy heading home to try ecological farming?’ I didn’t understand either of those terms at the time; I just wanted an excuse to go out and see the world.” And so, ever the sociable adventurer, Sun caught a lift on a coach bound for a neighbouring town in 2012, rode through to Chengdu without spending a penny.

The training delivered a crucial revelation to Sun Wenxiang: farming could be just as lucrative as wage labour. He learned that a fellow farmer, Wang Cheng, from Anlong Village in Chengdu’s suburban Pidu district, earned 60,000 yuan a year for himself and his partner from just four *mu* of land. By contrast, Sun’s role as mine manager came with heavy safety liabilities; even with a doubled bonus, his take-home pay barely matched that figure. By the eighth day of the first lunar month, he had already phoned the mine to hand in his resignation.

Full-time farming was no great leap for the couple. Sun’s wife, Xian Zhihui, had never left the land, and Sun himself would always return each year to help with the harvests.

Approaching the venture with an entrepreneurial mindset, they hired hands to clear the village’s long-fallow plots. “The grass was this high,” Sun said, holding his hand up to his waist. At the peak of their expansion, the family was leasing and managing nearly 30 *mu* of land in total.

◉ Attending external training programmes also helped Sun Wenxiang gain considerable attention from beyond his locality. The author of *Disappearing Foods* discovered him through the Slow Food movement and travelled to interview him.

III. Restoring Old Varieties

Xian Zhihui married into Dongyue Town from a nearby commune. In her and Sun Wenxiang’s recollection, the surrounding villages once grew Hongzui glutinous rice across the board. Sun Wenxiang still remembers how, as a child, every household made their own popped rice candy. This required Hongzui glutinous rice to prepare an ingredient known as *yin mi* (soaked, steamed, and then air-dried in the shade for half a month). Yet by 2014, when Sun Wenxiang sought to replant Hongzui glutinous rice, he could find no seeds left.

It was thanks to Xian Zhihui’s mother pointing them in the right direction: a household nearby on Bami Mountain was still cultivating Hongzui glutinous rice. Only then was Sun Wenxiang able to source seeds again. Afterwards, under Hongya County’s policy of converting cropland back to forest, rice farming on the mountain ceased entirely.

He also produces “*huo mi*” (fire rice) using traditional methods. The process involves pouring the grain into a large iron wok, filling it with water, and bringing it to a rolling boil over a wood-fired stove. The rice is constantly stirred as the high-temperature steam causes it to pop. Once the fire is extinguished and left overnight, the grains are dry-roasted over the heat again until every husk cracks open. After being sun-dried and de-husked, this rice retains a stronger chaff fragrance and expands more when steamed. It evokes the flavour memories of the local 1960s and 70s, harking back to the time before Sun Wenxiang turned ten.

◉ Smoked rice prepared by Sun Wenxiang using traditional methods. Photo: Sun Wenxiang

Sun Wenxiang’s approach to agroecology extends beyond the “Six Do-Nots” (no pesticides, chemical fertilisers, herbicides, growth hormones, plastic mulch, or GM seeds); he is equally concerned with flavour and health. He sources more than ten varieties of rice seed from across the country, conserving such a wide range in pursuit of a richer, sweeter taste. He harbours a deep fondness for a variety called “Zhejiang Gu”, which was cultivated during the collective farming era of his childhood. Many elderly villagers still fondly recall its fragrance, saying, “You don’t even need any side dishes; you can easily eat two or three bowls of just the rice.” Yet today, this variety has all but vanished.

The seeds for Bama Guzhen Fragrant Rice were sent to him by a client in Beijing. It is a non-local variety, and while he knows little about its place of origin or the climatic conditions it requires, it has successfully taken root and produced panicles, fetching 30 yuan per *jin* (500g) on the market.

Another variety newly introduced this year comes from Professor Ma Jun at the Institute of Rice Research, Sichuan Agricultural University. Other members of the village cooperative, which Sun Wenxiang leads, have already begun planting it.

He also dedicates space to a specific upland rice variety. The seeds were brought from Beijing by a client from Renshou in Meishan. It can be intercropped with other rice crops, yielding between 800 and 1,000 *jin* per *mu* (approx. 0.16 hectares).

Many fellow farmers have also shown interest in the seeds for Red-Beak Glutinous Rice, and he has distributed over 100 *jin* of them this year. Sun Wenxiang told us proudly that Yuan Longping’s team has also utilised this variety to develop a new hybrid rice strain.

However, to date, he has yet to find an old seed variety whose mouthfeel can rival that of Zhejiang Gu. This ongoing search continues to drive him to cultivate even more varieties.

◉ Congee made with Red-beak glutinous rice. Photo: Zhang Xiaomao

IV. The Disappearing Circular Ecosystem

Using traditional varieties and ecological farming and rearing methods has also left him feeling healthier.

Sun Wenxiang has noticed that his local black pigs rarely fall ill. He attributes this to both the robust disease resistance of these traditional breeds and their natural diet. He does not require a veterinarian for vaccinations, and can even deliver the piglets himself. Every day or two, he and his wife head into the fields to weed. They set aside specific forage plants, which form a substantial part of the black pigs’ feed. Their daily ration is supplemented with rice bran and maize flour. With pigs on the farm, the rice bran and any unsold maize can be consumed on-site.

Pig rearing thus becomes an indispensable component of Sun Wenxiang’s ecological farm—under the “six-no” ecological cultivation model, growers must brew their own biogas slurry, fermented plant juices, and oil cakes to enrich the soil. The manure from his nine black pigs is ideally suited for anaerobic fermentation, ultimately yielding a valuable fertiliser. In large-scale commercial pig farms, by contrast, faeces and the wastewater used to flush it away are diverted to treatment lagoons, managed as waste, and frequently become a source of pollution.

◉ Sun Wenxiang displaying the fermented juice buckets in the compost shed.

Without livestock, the farm’s composting would be inadequate, and the “cycle” simply couldn’t be maintained.

The cycle of soil fertility also demands balance. To make the most of the land’s nutrients and generate additional income, he interplants soybeans and sweet potatoes with rice and maize; alternatively, he sows rapeseed around the spring equinox, transplanting rice seedlings into the same plots by May. Unlike large-scale agriculture that keeps fields in production after the autumn harvest by growing medicinal herbs or cash crops, his fields are left to rest over winter. Cleared weeds and maize and rice straw are piled onto the soil to gradually rebuild fertility, allowing the land to rest and recover.

But much like heritage seeds that are steadily disappearing, pig breeding faces its own crisis: the threat of the lineage dying out.

Sun Wenxiang keeps a herd of heritage sows, but each breeding season he must source a boar elsewhere to avoid inbreeding. The village once kept an old-breed black boar, but it was unfortunately lost during the African swine fever outbreak. Since then, local farmers have had to rely on hybrid boar semen for artificial insemination.

The town still has one hybrid boar left, but Sun Wenxiang recently spoke to its owner, who is looking to part with it. Fewer smallholder farmers are keeping pigs these days; most simply buy their meat from elsewhere. Feeding a breeding boar throughout the year is a significant expense, and without enough sows to mate with, keeping one is simply not viable.

◉Sun Wenxiang and his wife Xian Zhihui are regulars at the Chengdu Lifestyle Market, where they have connected with numerous consumers keen to purchase ecologically grown produce and heritage breeds. The income they generate is sufficient to support them as full-time farmers. Photo: Zhang Xiaomao

V. Hard Work Sustains Agriculture

Because herbicides are off the table, ecological farming is intensely hard work. As Sun Wenxiang ushered us into the courtyard to greet us, Xian Zhihui had already returned to the fields to cut grass. Nor could the elderly father idle about; he was up on the hill harvesting bamboo.

Sun remarks that farm labour is truly endless; sometimes it runs from first light until dark.

In some regions, ecological agriculture emphasises the symbiotic relationship between crops and weeds. But on the hot, humid hills of Sichuan, if left uncut for just a few days, weeds will grow dense enough to blot out the sky and crowd out the crops. They must be cut every single day.

Sun also relies entirely on manual labour to fertilise the fields. They blend biogas slurry, oil cake and fermented liquid fertiliser, then carry the mixture into the fields on shoulder poles, basket by basket. Each load weighs between 40 and 50 kilograms (80 to 100 *jin*). He keeps carrying until every plot is fully fertilised. There is no machinery that can replace this gruelling work.

Ecological cultivation also means longer growing cycles. For instance, without greenhouses or plastic mulch to retain soil warmth, heirloom pumpkins take ten months to harvest, and peppers need an extra half-month to ripen.

Across their roughly 1.5 acres of farmland, the three of them do not stick to rigid roles. During peak seasons, Sun, his wife and his father work side by side transplanting rice seedlings and planting corn. Once the harvest is in, Sun handles dispatches and greets customers and visitors, which grants him a modicum of downtime. But Xian Zhihui only works harder. “She is always out in the fields, and she also has to cut fodder for the pigs. Look at her hands and feet—covered in thick calluses and cracks. If the dew from the grass gets into them, they easily become infected.” That is simply the reality for anyone truly working the land.

◉ Xian Zhihui cutting grass in the fields.

VI. Who Will Safeguard the Heirloom Varieties?

*Vanishing Foods* is not the first book to explore the importance of traditional varieties for ecology, culture and food security. Yet, while cultivating these old varieties may seem like a service to all of humanity, for the farmers themselves it is largely a spontaneous, grassroots endeavour. Sun Wenxiang has received no government subsidies for his efforts, despite the fact that his ecological farming methods have earned recognition from authorities at every level.

One year, he was invited by the Hongya County government to attend a training course for agricultural brokers—an exception made specifically for him. He was also awarded a scholarship of over ten thousand yuan to cover his travel and tuition fees. This was when Sichuan Province was pushing forward with its ‘Tianfu Granary’ initiative. In a cohort of fifty, he was by far the oldest, and the only participant practising ecological farming; everyone else relied on large-scale cultivation with chemical fertilisers and pesticides.

Sun Wenxiang has also tried to encourage more people to adopt ecological farming. Back in the twelfth lunar month of 2013, he gathered around seven or eight villagers for a meeting to advocate the principles of ecological agriculture. However, the general consensus was that forgoing chemical fertilisers and herbicides would result in unacceptably low yields, and hand-weeding was simply too labour-intensive.

In recent years, a growing number of villagers in their fifties and sixties have begun returning to the countryside. He gestured towards a series of small terraced hillsides behind his vegetable plot. The plots that Sun Wenxiang had painstakingly reclaimed and cultivated had been taken back by these returning villagers, but, alas, they had quickly reverted to conventional methods: applying chemical fertilisers, spraying pesticides, and sowing hybrid seeds. Even when growing food for their own families, they prioritised convenience over effort. “My wife still has to go out into the fields to pull weeds,” he explained, “but they won’t do that. They’d rather sit at home, play cards and eat.”

◉ ‘Red-mouth’ glutinous rice grown by Sun Wenxiang’s family (bottom right). In the distance are the rice nurseries and the paddies that have been reclaimed by other villagers for large-scale cultivation.

It is not that ecological farming suffers from weak market demand or poor financial returns. Sun Wenxiang has crunched the figures: he averages over 10,000 yuan in profit per mu each year, and demand still outstrips supply. Yet ecological farming remains undeniably exhausting, and the required standards are exceedingly difficult to maintain. “It doesn’t matter if the acreage shrinks. We’re getting on in years, after all, and can’t manage to cultivate much more.” He is 61 this year; his father is 87.

Sun Wenxiang’s daughter lives in Wenjiang District, Chengdu. She studied animal husbandry in Ya’an and is willing to return to take over her parents’ ecological farm, but wishes to wait until her own daughter completes secondary school first. Her husband, meanwhile, lacks a hand for agricultural labour. Will the couple be able to step up as the farm’s new stewards? Sun Wenxiang cannot say.

◉ Through Chengdu lifestyle markets and his own personal network, Sun Wenxiang is able to sell ecological produce at a premium. Photo: Sun Wenxiang, Zhang Xiaomao

VII. Beyond flavour, what else will we lose?

Climate change has also taken its toll on Sun Wenxiang’s crops. This spring, widespread drought gripped central and southern China. Across Sichuan, temperatures soared, reaching 38°C even at higher altitudes. The corn leaves withered completely, stripped of their green hue. He spent money channeling river water from mountain ravines to irrigate the fields. Pumps were needed almost every day; when one burnt out, he simply bought another.

The rains that usually fall in May were delayed by over a month. When they finally arrived in late June and early July, they came as torrential downpours, flattening the corn fields.

Sun Wenxiang paid for both the pumps and the electricity himself, noting that rural electricity rates are the same as in the city. That said, the government is also funding rural development: at the highest point of his fields stands a “pest-repellent lamp” gifted by the authorities, reportedly costing 3,000 yuan. The local council is also installing streetlights in the village. Having grown accustomed to the pitch-black rural nights, Sun worries the new lights will draw swarms of insects, disrupt natural cycles, and ultimately harm the crops.

Since 2024, under government coordination, many villagers have leased their plots to private investors from outside the area at a rate of 550 yuan per mu annually. These lands are now managed centrally to develop “high-standard farmland.” Former farmers have become casual labourers, earning 10 to 20 yuan an hour, waiting at home for work to come their way. It wasn’t until long after the spring equinox this year that the first batch of rice seedlings was finally planted.

But policy is shifting too. Sun has realised that small-scale family operations, such as husband-and-wife farming teams, may well become the new direction encouraged by the government. On 2 July, he received a notice from the county Agriculture and Rural Affairs Bureau requesting him to submit a profile. The provincial authorities are looking for exemplary grain farms run primarily by families, where total income matches what could be earned from migrant work. A provincial daily newspaper is also planning to interview him. In the past, attention usually fell on large-scale operators managing tens of thousands of mu.

Sun notes that with the economy struggling these past two years, even migrant workers find themselves drifting in and out of employment throughout the year. He suspects even more people will return home next year.

Will the future belong to high-standard farmland or smallholder cultivation? Will land be merely tended, left to lie fallow, or give rise to more family-run ecological farms? In Qilong Village, Sun’s small plots—cultivated with heirloom rice, heritage potatoes, and threaded through with weeds and wildflowers—seem rather solitary. The subtitle of the book *Vanishing Food* poses the same question on a broader scale: Beyond flavour, what else will we lose?

Author for Foodthink

Pei Dan

A writer who has found her footing, focusing on the individuals shaped by climate change, ecological shifts, and broader transformations.

– Event Preview –

This morning, Sun Wenxiang will appear at the Chengdu Lifestyle Market as one of the guests for a book reading of *Vanishing Food*, curated by Foodthink. He will share his experiences in ecological farming and preserving heritage crop varieties.

At the market, visitors can not only purchase his produce but also meet other small-scale ecological farmers from across Sichuan, sampling a wide array of local traditional ingredients. Readers in Chengdu are welcome to head to the market today to attend the book reading. Those further afield can book a spot for the market’s live stream of the event, or catch the replay afterwards.

Images: Unless otherwise stated, all photos by the author

Editor: Tianle

Poster design: Z X