Entering Villages with Ideals for Public-Service Work – What Detours Did He Take?

Taking advantage of a break at a conference in Nanning, we sought out our old friend Huang Yajun.

As a seasoned rural worker, Yajun, born in the 1980s, has experienced multiple phases of rural development over more than a decade, from grassroots self-initiated exploration to government-led poverty-elimination campaigns and rural revitalisation programmes. In different villages, he and the villagers have grown rice and sold grain; raised chickens and sold eggs; picked green plums and brewed green plum wine; run a guesthouse and organised rural tourism… weathering various setbacks along the way.

The idea that prompted this conversation, however, stemmed from an academic paper. The authors argued that Yajun and his colleagues’ work in rural areas runs counter to the broader modernisation process “represented by industrialisation and urbanisation” — which is why it has repeatedly failed.

Yet what truly constitutes the direction of development? Should one simply “go with the flow”? On these questions, everyone may have a different answer. Over the past decade or so, different theories have cycled through, one stepping off the stage as the next steps on, each attempting to guide the practice of rural development. But for Yajun, what matters is that practitioners should also have their own judgement and reflection.

The content of this podcast episode is Yajun’s account as a practitioner. It speaks not only to the meaning as rural workers see it, but also invites us to reconsider where rural issues are headed. Admittedly, amid social change, not every village can flourish; yet there will always need to be people like Yajun who explore with unwavering persistence.

Foodthink also hopes that all readers living in cities can keenly feel the complex connections between issues such as food safety, social equity, and population and labour, and the countryside. Without understanding China’s rural areas, we can hardly hope to truly understand the many social issues we face in our daily lives. We trust this episode will bring you inspiration and reflection.

This Episode’s Guest

Yajun

From the Deep Cultivation Social Work Service Centre, Conghua District, Guangzhou; a rural worker. He has lived in villages, worked the fields, and through his rural work has bridged his past and his future.

This Episode’s Host

Tianle

Founding editor of Foodthink and convener of the Beijing Organic Farmers’ Market. Having worked in the food and agriculture system for more than a decade, they are keenly aware of their own limitations and can only work from the city. They particularly admire partners who work directly in rural communities and achieve tangible results.

Wang Hao

Editor at Foodthink. Last year, briefly worked alongside Yajun in a village.

Around 2012, Yajun holding a meeting with a poultry-raising cooperative in a village in Yunnan (top); the cooperative loading chickens and eggs for shipment (bottom).

Another exploration in cooperative economics: the “Seven Fairies” of Xianniangxi Village in Conghua, Guangdong, running a guesthouse together in the village.

The green plum industry in Xianniangxi Village’s development phase has been inseparable from the support of charitable organisations. Pictured: in 2023, villagers from the green plum cooperative smoking their freshly harvested plums to make wūméi (smoked plums).

Deep Cultivation’s work is not limited to cooperative economics, either. Pictured: the “Parents’ Canteen” set up by Deep Cultivation for left-behind elderly in Xianniangxi Village (top), and organising the elderly to tend a vegetable garden together (bottom).

Timeline

00:27 The wave of rural development encompasses far more than “rural construction”: Yajun and his team represent just one of the many diverse attempts within that tide.

06:46 In today’s highly urbanised world, does the countryside exist merely to serve the cities? Are there other possibilities for rural areas?

08:26 Yajun and his colleagues have been living and working in villages, helping farmers set up cooperatives for rice cultivation, green plum processing, and more.

09:52 Why do farmers need to band together and form cooperatives? Can’t they simply take their own chickens to the market and sell them? What happens to atomised individual farmers when they face the market?

13:37 How many difficulties must be faced in helping farmers establish standardised production systems and reasonable sales channels?

19:49 Why are young people willing to “enter villages” and do public-service work? How can young people with simple, earnest ideals truly understand the countryside? A look at how Yajun and his team approach their work in rural areas.

37:33 Can there be closer interaction between academic research and on-the-ground work? Beyond critique, has the academic world offered practitioners more support through observation and reflection?

43:33 If a theory concludes that “the countryside has no future”, should we simply give up? The necessity of action cannot be dismissed.

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Click the titles below to read related articles

The academic paper that sparked this podcast episode:

When the Idealism of Rural Construction Meets Economic Realities: Reflections on the Contemporary New Rural Construction Movement

Deep Cultivation’s team response to the paper:

Responding to “Reflections”: What Kind of Theoretical Work Do Practitioners Need?