Post-flood Wuchang: affected farmers invisible behind the sales lens

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In early August this year, Wuchang in Heilongjiang suffered rare torrential rains and floods, with approximately 40% of the local 2.5 million mu of farmland submerged.

Two months after the disaster, livestreamers selling Wuchang rice appeared on e-commerce platforms. Set against a backdrop of lush, harvested fields, they assured consumers that the damage had not been severe and that they could purchase Daohua Xiang rice with confidence.

What actually happened in Wuchang this summer? What truth is revealed—or concealed—behind these contradictory messages? Through the story of one ordinary farming family, the author, Yvonne, attempts to understand how extreme weather events impact farmers.

As previously explained in a Foodthink article, farmers are the “unsung heroes” of climate change adaptation. With the COP28 climate summit approaching, we hope this article encourages long-term attention and support for farmers, moving beyond the fleeting interest that typically follows a disaster.

At the end of July, Typhoon Doksuri made landfall in Jinjiang, Fujian Province. At the time, I was working in Nanjing, following the typhoon’s progress via livestreams. To my surprise, Doksuri continued its northward march all the way to Heilongjiang—my hometown. Wuchang, a renowned rice-producing city, suffered a disaster the likes of which had not been seen for decades. In my experience, tropical cyclones like typhoons and hurricanes usually only affect coastal regions; extreme rainfall events of this magnitude rarely occur in the inland northeast.

So, what was the actual situation in Wuchang? Were the disaster reports in the news accurate? Through a close friend, I managed to gather some fragmented information from the affected areas.

I. The Floods Arrive

“I’ve never seen water like this in my life…”

This is what Third Grandfather, who lives in Yingchengzi Village in Wuchang, told me. In his eyes, even the Great Flood of 1998 was not as fierce as this. Now in his seventies, he still works the land, never missing a day of the year’s farm work. Over the phone, he described the terrifying scene of the flood.

On the morning of 6 August, when Third Grandfather reached the edge of his fields, the land had completely vanished; all he could see was a vast ocean. An endless expanse of yellow silty water had swallowed the rice paddies. There was no horizon, only a few stray rice ears poking a few centimetres above the water, swaying with the current. Many other villagers stood with him on the embankments, watching their land. They didn’t speak; the men just smoked in silence, stunned.

Third Grandfather, his wife, and their daughter’s family have 100 mu of land in total: 70 mu of contracted land and 30 mu allocated to the family. The 70 mu of open fields were largely unaffected as they sit on higher ground, about 2 kilometres from the Lalin River. However, the other 30 mu, located on the river-bend land by the Lalin River, yielded nothing this year.

● The morning of 6 August: the scene at Third Grandfather’s rice fields by the Lalin River. This entire area was submerged under floodwaters.
If the 30 mu of Daohua Xiang No. 2 rice had been sold normally, it would have brought in roughly 90,000 yuan. After deducting 60,000 to 70,000 yuan for seedlings, agricultural supplies, hired labour, and machinery, the family would have made a profit of 20,000 to 30,000 yuan. This year, the costs were fully invested, but the harvest was a total loss. It is as if they worked the whole year only to lose 60,000 or 70,000 yuan.

Third Grandfather’s daughter, Aunt Xiu’er, lamented to me: “Farmers work hard all year, only to make no money and even lose what they have. While the remaining 70 mu provide enough for the family to eat and live, a whole year of hard work has gone to waste.”

II. Before and After the Flood Discharge

Before the rice fields were submerged, Wuchang experienced days of continuous rainfall. On the morning of 2 August, the Wuchang Meteorological Observatory issued an orange rainstorm warning; by the afternoon of 3 August, it was upgraded to red. During those days, the villagers stayed huddled in their homes, waiting for the rain to stop.

Despite the warnings, Third Grandfather was not worried that the rain would threaten the crops by the river. When he checked the fields on the morning of the 4th, the water level had risen, but it had not yet covered the rice ears. Years of experience told him that as long as the rice heads remained above water, the plants would survive once the water receded.

The critical turning point came on the 5th. That day, Third Grandfather and his wife were notified by village officials: due to days of torrential rain, the Mopanshan and Longfengshan reservoirs upstream were full and needed to discharge water. For their own safety, villagers along the banks of the Lalin River were required to evacuate. Third Grandfather said there was simply no time to think; he quickly packed some clothes and dry rations, and he and Third Grandmother left in a village official’s car for a temporary shelter in a nearby town.

That night, the reservoirs discharged their water. The flood surged over the embankments, turning thousands of mu of rice fields into a sea. Early on the 6th, anxious to see his land, Third Grandfather hitched a ride back, leading to the scene described at the beginning.

● To the south of Third Grandfather’s village, Yingchengzi, lie the Lalin and Mangniu Rivers. Many fields are right on the riverbanks; further southeast upstream are the Mopanshan and Longfengshan reservoirs, where the emergency flood discharge occurred.
● The state of villages and land downstream after the Longfengshan Reservoir discharge. Image source: social media blogger “Rural Big Brother Hanbing”.

Third Grandfather told me repeatedly that if the flood had come slightly earlier or later, the damage would not have been so severe. A month earlier, the rice would not have flowered or pollinated yet; a month later, it would have been in the late grain-filling or dough stage. In either case, short-term flooding would not have caused a total crop failure. The worst possible timing is when the rice is flowering and just beginning to fill the grain.

● Rice in the flowering stage had just begun grain-filling; the grains are shrivelled and unfilled, with mud still clinging to the ears after the flood.
Beyond the 30 mu of flooded rice fields, the vegetable gardens around his house were also submerged; the fruits, vegetables, and the chicks in the coop were completely wiped out. Fortunately, the flood only just cleared the threshold, so the belongings inside the house suffered no further loss.

However, Third Grandfather said he heard losses elsewhere were much worse. Some of his relatives live in a village only a few kilometres from the reservoir; after the discharge, a corner of their house collapsed, the floodwater surged onto the kang (heated brick bed), and all the electrical appliances inside were destroyed. Nearby cattle farmers, unable to evacuate in time, saw dozens of dairy cows—their entire livelihood—drown in the flood.

When mentioning the upstream reservoir discharge, Third Grandfather said: “I don’t know. There’s no helping it. You can’t blame anyone, and you can’t resent anyone. This is a natural disaster; no one can stop it.”

III. Post-disaster Reconstruction

The disaster may have passed, but recovery remains a long process.

Part of the 30 mu of floodplain land owned by San Yeye was covered in silt, turning into sand dunes. Another part lay exposed in the slurry—a mud-grey expanse of rice fields, from stalk to ear, coated in muddy water. A total crop failure was now an inevitable fact; he no longer spent effort trying to restore the land to its former state, but instead waited to prepare the soil for next year’s planting.

They had taken out agricultural insurance for the fields, which offers compensation of around 200–300 yuan per mu for a total crop failure. In reality, however, receiving this compensation is a protracted process. Previous reports have noted that the journey from filing a claim to receiving the payout is long, requiring contact with the local claims department and the dispatch of experts to verify the damage and calculate the payout based on the policy. For farmers, this process demands knowledge and time that far exceed their daily experiences; consequently, even with agricultural insurance as a safeguard, not everyone is insured or manages to receive a payout. By the end of September, when I interviewed him, nearly two months had passed since the flood occurred and receded, yet San Yeye’s family had still not received their compensation.

● Widespread lodging has occurred in the rice fields soaked by the flood, with muddy water clinging to the ears and stalks.
Beyond insurance and government aid, rebuilding ultimately depends on the farmers themselves. The villagers rented water pumps to drain their fields and repaired houses and courtyards torn down by the floods. They told me that a home must be rebuilt by one’s own hands; it cannot be achieved by waiting or asking. While repairing a collapsed courtyard wall might take a month, and a destroyed house a year, the recovery takes much longer once livelihoods are severely impacted—a detail often overlooked in reports on disasters.

On the evening of 18 September, the Harbin Meteorological Observatory issued a yellow warning for thunderstorms and strong winds, with gusts of force 7–8, reaching 9–10 in some areas, accompanied by short-term heavy precipitation, hail, and lightning. San Yeye’s village and the surrounding area were among those local hotspots. After a day and night of gales, his rice fields suffered widespread lodging. Although this had little impact on the total yield, the impending harvest could no longer be carried out on a large scale using machinery; it had to be done by hand. This shift in harvesting method alone doubled the cost, all of which had to be borne by the farmer.

San Yeye’s daughter, Aunt Xiu’er, told me: “Being a farmer means learning to coexist with natural disasters.” For millennia, it has seemed an immutable law that those who produce food and the crops themselves must passively accept the impacts of climatic change. But as extreme weather events become more frequent, the impact on agricultural production will only increase. Farmers will continue to be the vulnerable group, passively bearing the losses and risks brought by disaster. If we can learn from every disaster, and if there were more social and policy support, then perhaps the next time risk arrives, there might be less harm and more ways forward.

IV. The Aftermath: Was there a “total crop failure”?

Wuchang has been hit by disaster, and the public’s primary concern in the aftermath is the severity of the rice losses. In Yingchengzi Village, where Third Grandpa lives, the villagers’ floodplain lands were almost entirely submerged, resulting in near-total crop failure. Across the Wuchang production area, post-flood estimates suggest that out of 2.5 million mu of paddy, approximately 1 million mu were flooded, with an estimated yield reduction of 40% to 50%.

While the reduction in yield is an established fact, during the harvest season, local young farmers livestreaming on platforms like Douyin and Kuaishou present a different picture. Setting up phone tripods in their paddies, they broadcast daily to sell rice, showcasing the seemingly normal sight of harvesters at work while explaining why Wuchang rice tastes so good and why the price is so high. This contrasts sharply with the media reports of “total crop failure” during the August floods. The hosts repeatedly assure their audience that the heavy rain and floods had little impact and that the crops were not lost. To be sure, on a macro level, a reduction in yield is not the same as total failure; however, for any smallholder facing a total loss, it means harvesting absolutely nothing. This includes the young farmers selling rice on livestreaming platforms. What is the tension behind this divergence between promotional sales and reality? I believe the issues of brand building and market chaos surrounding Wuchang rice are significant factors.

Wuchang rice has long been renowned for its high quality and premium price, particularly the famous “Daohua Xiang No. 2”, which produces fragrant, soft, and sweet rice that can fetch 8-10 yuan per jin on the market. However, due to the small cultivation area, authentic, locally grown “Daohua Xiang No. 2” is extremely rare. Although “Wuchang Rice” sold on the market requires local brand certification, inadequate protection and supervision have led to a long-term proliferation of counterfeits. It is difficult for consumers to find genuine “Daohua Xiang No. 2”; worse still, they may be buying rice that wasn’t even grown in Wuchang.

●Do you recognise these two varieties of rice? The variety on the left is Changli Xiang, which is long-grained and lacks fragrance; the one on the right is Daohua Xiang, featuring 20%-40% opacity in the centre and an external fragrance. When blended, it is generally difficult to distinguish the two, yet the price of Changli Xiang is less than half that of Daohua Xiang. Source: Social media blogger “Rural Mu Laoda”.

The local young farmers who act as hosts differ from ordinary farmers in that they have added sales and some procurement stages to their work, thereby increasing their income. They must often bear the impact of the disaster on their sales personally, so they point their phones at the fields to create an illusion of a bumper harvest, using the claim of “no total failure” to declare their rice as authentic and genuine. For them, the priority is maintaining consumer trust; whether the actual yield reduction is severe or whether the rice they sell truly originates from Wuchang is less important. This creates a paradox: while livestreaming seems to give the public a direct view of the land, the true extent of the farmers’ suffering remains obscured.

For consumers, “fake rice” has caused long-term anxiety, and the floods have made this psychological state more complex. On one hand, some compassionate consumers sincerely wish to help Wuchang farmers by purchasing their rice. On the other hand, the yield reduction caused by the floods has driven up prices, leading consumers to suspect that merchants are using the disaster as an opportunity to hike prices, thereby increasing the risk of buying “fake rice”. The floods have pushed Wuchang into the spotlight of public opinion, further catalysing a “crisis of trust” regarding the rice.

In an opaque market, Third Grandpa chose to contact buyers early to sell his remaining 70 mu of paddy. The procurement price rose from 2.5 yuan per jin last year to 3.2 yuan this year, with some townships reportedly reaching 3.6 yuan per jin.

Note: These prices refer to the raw grain price. Once raw grain enters the mill and is processed into rice, the milling rate is generally 50%. For instance, a procurement price of 3.6 yuan per jin for paddy translates to a raw rice price of 7.2 yuan per jin, not including other costs such as packaging, logistics, and labour. When consumers determine if the “Wuchang Rice” they have bought is authentic, price is one of the key indicators.

Buyers handle the downstream chain, including transport, processing, packaging, advertising, sales, and after-sales service. They have professional teams to develop the market, manage public opinion, and drive sales, dispersing and mitigating the crisis of consumer trust caused by partial crop failures. For smallholders, although the procurement price is lower, it is far less stressful than selling the produce themselves.

●Mid-October: A livestreaming room selling Wuchang rice, where the host is showcasing the harvest.

V. Epilogue

Winter has arrived, and Third Grandpa’s family in the Northeast is preparing to move into a heated apartment in the city to winter over. In his view, this winter’s weather has also been unusual. Recently, temperatures have been about ten degrees higher than in previous years, but since November, there have already been four or five heavy snowstorms. The wet snow, mixed with ice pellets and freezing rain, has a more negative impact than pure snow.

For the land, a winter covered in white snow is a time for rest and recovery. “A timely snow promises a bumper harvest”; Third Grandpa hopes this year’s heavy snow will bring favourable weather and a bountiful harvest next year.

●Wuchang: The land after the rice harvest. Photography: maggy

○ References:

https://news.cctv.com/2023/08/06/ARTIfRBnEs83kkpRS7As1pWC230806.shtml

https://politics.gmw.cn/2023-08/28/content_36793461.htm

Foodthink Author

Yvonne

A person dedicated to understanding and explaining the “Anthropocene” that has exhausted the external world. A sociology student on the run, focusing on agriculture, the environment, and climate change.

 

 

 

Unless otherwise stated, images are provided by the interviewees

Editor: Wang Hao

Published by Foodthink