Two and a Half Years as an Agricultural Journalist, Yet I Still Can’t “See” Food
Yet it did not take long before I realised our story assignments were sourced almost entirely from listed companies’ announcements and financial reports.Performance targets demanded more than a dozen pieces a month, meaning the vast majority of my articles relied on telephone or WeChat interviews and had to be filed by day’s end. Travelling for on-the-ground reporting was a rare occurrence.
It is hardly surprising, then, that despite writing about what we eat every single day, I remained utterly blind to the food itself—corporate financial reports only ever depict macroeconomic trends. Such accounts are remarkably broad. Relying solely on the three standard financial statements (note: the core reports in financial accounting: the balance sheet, income statement, and cash flow statement) cannot possibly clarify how food is produced, processed, and consumed, nor how much of it is discarded along the way. I found myself constantly wondering: am I truly practising journalism?
1. The Unseen Pus-Filled Pork
I still wanted to trace exactly where their pork went. As I dug deeper into my research, I stumbled upon an unexpected clue.
On a short-video platform, someone was venting: “You can never finish trimming the abscesses on the front legs of pigs from their farm.” — They were referring to that very enterprise. In the replies, one commenter noted, “They’ve been given too many injections.” Another added, “They take the abscess-ridden meat back to feed to dogs.”
Their identities were easy enough to guess: they were almost all slaughterhouse workers. In the pig slaughtering process, there is a step known as carcass trimming. During this stage, any parts of the animal deemed unfit for human consumption are removed and classified as waste. Some supermarkets and independent butchers will also further trim and refine the cuts before putting them on sale.
The reference to “injections” points to vaccinations. If a pig is slaughtered before a vaccine has fully absorbed, it will develop abscesses at the injection sites. This is undoubtedly the result of farming enterprises pushing for production efficiency at all costs. After all, boosting output is precisely how the sector attempts to safeguard its margins when market cycles turn downwards.
At the time, I simply didn’t have the bandwidth to follow up. So I opted to put it aside and submit the draft first.
Throughout those two years, the bulk of my writing revolved around this kind of macro-level agricultural reporting. Covering large enterprises is, admittedly, excellent professional training. Tracking business shifts and market challenges day after day quickly sharpens your grasp of industry trajectories, and commerce is, after all, a vital thread in understanding how society functions.
Yet, the more I wrote about big corporations, the more of an outsider I remained to agriculture itself. Ultimately, much of my reporting failed to break free from the confines of macroeconomic data analysis and debates over supply and demand.
So, when I first spotted those “pustules”, I was actually thrilled. It was a lead that nobody had touched. Even from a purely pragmatic angle, if I could get to the bottom of the issue, it might earn me a measure of respect from the company’s PR team. Historically, communication with them had been a struggle; they were like the “living dead” lying dormant in my contacts, ignoring every phone call and WeChat message. It was only after a colleague published a piece that finally “touched a nerve” with them that we managed to establish a tentative line of communication.
In the end, however, I didn’t pursue the lead myself, most likely out of reluctance to take on the challenge. No matter how I looked at it, the resources at my disposal simply weren’t enough to locate interviewees along the slaughterhouse supply chain, or to actually step foot in a slaughterhouse to find answers. On top of that, the deadline for my next article was fast approaching.
II. When the Journalist Finds Themselves in a Downcycle
Take the duck farming supply chain, for instance. Duck meat itself fetches a lower price than its by-products. To clear stock and find a market, some operators mislabel it as beef or lamb. Industry reports also note that much of this duck meat ultimately ends up in the catering contracts for building sites. In an age when meat, eggs and dairy are readily available, I realised for the first time that our consumption of these very staples can still draw lines between different demographics.
Viewed this way, without this role, I likely wouldn’t have paid attention to price shifts at the local market, nor would I find myself wondering, while shopping online or ordering delivery, where these ingredients originate and who ultimately buys them. Yet, probing why people have stopped buying milk, or why certain groups end up relying on cheap duck meat, carries a faint echo of the old adage: ‘why not just eat cake?’
Journalists tend to rely on a familiar editorial framework, and tracking price movements is a staple of it. Price acts as a straightforward entry point: it ties into broader macroeconomic trends while simultaneously mirroring daily household spending. Fluctuations typically stem from an imbalance between supply and demand. Unluckily, my entry into agricultural reporting coincided with a prolonged price slump, marked by oversupply and weakening demand. That surplus was born from the optimism of the previous boom cycle; it seemed as though the market would expand indefinitely. Nearly everyone ramped up investment, banking on hefty returns. Yet the stark reality is that boom cycles inevitably turn, and consumers inevitably downshift their spending.
Yet the reality of actually growing crops and raising livestock is nowhere to be found in that picture. Every earnings season, the revenues of those agricultural companies often still lag behind the profits generated by tech and industrial firms. Most agribusinesses don’t deal directly with consumers, so they have little need to build consumer-facing brands or engage with the press. On top of that, my own articles—which were often little more than recycled talking points—drew almost no readership and consistently came dead last for traffic. In the end, I couldn’t save my job.
Three: Can Standardisation Solve Everything?
This approach sidesteps the age-old challenges of traditional farming—being at the mercy of the weather and dealing with inconsistent, non-standardised produce—while significantly streamlining operations. For consumers, standardisation means fruit shopping is no longer a guessing game; you won’t savour a perfectly crisp batch one week only to find the flavour entirely different the next.
I have visited orchards operating on similar principles in Zhaotong in Yunnan and Pinggu in Beijing. Here, not only are the row and plant spacings meticulously uniform, but the trees themselves are pruned into identical shapes, standing in ranks like a military formation so that every single fruit receives an equal share of sunlight. Harvested produce undergoes strict grading, with specialised machinery sorting the fruit to guarantee consistency in size, shape, and even sweetness.
I have even had a chance to take the wheel of a smart tractor priced at over a million yuan. While we are still hotly debating the safety of autonomous driving in urban environments, this technology has already found a highly effective, real-world application: large-scale farmland. Had Jeremy Clarkson opted for a tractor equipped with advanced driver-assistance systems rather than a Lamborghini tractor, he might have spared himself the crooked, zigzagging furrows he famously ploughed.
The livestock sector follows a similar pattern. Modern farming enterprises can now use sensors to precisely track how much feed each pig consumes, calculating exactly how much meat that feed will yield. This precision management effectively drives down rearing costs.
When I first began covering agriculture, I was equally captivated by these narratives. I truly believed that technology would free farming from the mercy of the weather, eradicate all uncertainty, and ultimately put an end to hunger while ensuring better food for everyone.
In reality, urban consumers in China are already reaping the benefits of this convenience. Living in Beijing means access to a steady supply of fresh fruit and vegetables throughout the year. Groceries can be delivered straight to your door; if you don’t fancy cooking, you can order takeaway or simply pop into a nearby restaurant…
While the basic necessities of survival appear effortlessly met, the very act of ‘eating’ has increasingly lost its weight. We neither see the food itself nor understand how it is produced, and wasting it no longer carries a sense of shame. The ancient admonition—‘Who knows that every grain in the bowl is hard-won?’—has become a moral boundary all too easily crossed, requiring government-led initiatives like the ‘Clean Plate Campaign’ to reinforce.
As a consumer, one might find some reassurance in greater transparency. Yet as a journalist—merely one link in the chain of information dissemination—I find myself profoundly powerless. Companies readily speak of economies of scale, direct sourcing from farms, contract agriculture, and QR code traceability… Most often, I am left to accept their business acumen and proposed solutions at face value, unwittingly becoming a conduit for their market messaging.
Still, I cannot wholly embrace that commercial reality. Even from a purely logical standpoint, large-scale production does not guarantee safety; it merely means that when something goes wrong, the affected food will be distributed on a vastly greater scale. Coupled with the sprawling logistics network for agricultural goods, the fallout inevitably spreads further and wider.
This leaves me with a lingering sense of unease. Some time ago, a friend who breeds cattle told me that back in his hometown, the Darhan Mumingad Banner of Baotou, many people see returning to raise cattle as a safe haven. Today, “returning to the countryside to farm” has become a favoured media theme. Yet once they do return, farming under this model would incur prohibitive costs, compounded by the cyclical volatility of agricultural prices. Is going back to the land truly a viable path? And if smallholders are forced out of agriculture entirely, will city life really offer them a better future?
IV. My Experimental Plot
The cost was never going to be recovered, of course. But by getting my hands dirty, I gained a slightly deeper, more grounded understanding of the field I cover.
At the end of July, when the crops were thriving, I left on a nine-day trip. Before departing, I asked a friend to help with the watering. Then I checked the forecast and saw that Beijing was in for a spell of continuous rain, so I told them not to bother.
Upon my return, Beijing was experiencing another run of heavy downpours. The ground became hopelessly waterlogged and impassable, leaving me unable to check on the little plot for roughly half a month. I reasoned that nature would look after the vegetables for me.
What I actually faced was utter devastation: all the leafy greens had perished, the chillies were waterlogged and rotting, and only a few tomato plants had survived, hanging on by a thread. Only the mint and perilla, untouched by generations of human domestication and cultivation, thrived in the aftermath of the storms.
Throughout August, the weather swung between scorching heat and heavy rain; not a single replacement plant survived. I was not alone. Commercial vegetable growers suffered equally heavy losses due to the weather, driving prices through the roof last summer. When it comes to climate change, novices and veterans alike are remarkably vulnerable.
I not only had to contend with the weather, but farming also took a severe toll on my body.
When I first started farming, I decided against weeding. I had heard that leaving weeds provides better soil cover, and that their root systems help protect the habitat of soil microorganisms.
Yet almost everyone who passed by would ask, “Why aren’t you weeding?” One day, an elderly neighbour stopped to ask the same question, and I eagerly explained what I had learned.
He retorted, “Did you read that on Douyin?” His implication was clear: I had been misled by short videos. I tried to defend my stance, but only ended up irritating him. I never managed to mend fences with him, and on our subsequent encounters at the farm, he wouldn’t so much as look my way.
In the end, I couldn’t bear the pressure and spent ages battling the weeds. Squatting in the fields to pull them by hand gave me knee trouble that took until this summer to fully heal.
Aside from its therapeutic benefits, farming did little to help my reporting. I eventually had to return to the craft itself to find my answers.
The sector does offer fresh angles: young farmers returning to the countryside, consumer brands moving into upstream cultivation, and novel agricultural ingredients surfacing in hotpot and tea drink chains. Such stories are plentiful. Yet can such pieces truly do justice to agriculture?
While researching Shine Muscat grapes, I met an older woman. Once I’d finally convinced her I was a journalist, she became immediately emotional, venting her anger at what she saw as a ruthless media. She explained that her family had lost a fortune to fraud in the construction trade, so they’d turned to growing Shine Muscat to make ends meet, only to be hit by a market crash. To her, my interview felt like rubbing salt in the wound.
I had caused quite a scene that day. I hurriedly sent WeChat messages and texts to apologise, and it took quite a bit of talking to calm her down. She even passed on her husband’s number, urging me to speak with him instead.
I made no further contact and deleted our entire conversation. By then, I had gathered ample material from growers, and my angle was straightforward: to document how the Shine Muscat boom had turned to bust. I saw no need to trouble them further. Besides, a lightweight journalistic piece could never properly hold the weight of such personal devastation.
Over those two and a half years, moments like these repeatedly forced me to ask myself what kind of agricultural journalism I truly wanted to do, and how to go about it.
I occasionally recall my former editor. He once said that our edge lay in spending every day immersed with industry insiders, allowing us to pick up on shifts in the sector as they happened. Those words struck a chord, and I came to treat them as gospel.
Since stepping into agricultural journalism, my two and a half years of writing have revealed an increasingly complex landscape.Agriculture is far more than business models; it is a matter of survival. It encompasses high-tech precision farming as much as deeply rooted traditions, and I have grown increasingly restless about confining my reporting to a purely commercial lens.
I still don’t have a clear answer on how to proceed. But I know I can no longer write about agriculture as an outsider. The only path forward echoes my former editor’s advice: immerse myself with those working in the field every single day. I need to get closer.
In an age where putting food on the table is largely taken for granted, agriculture attracts a fraction of the attention lavished on the soaring tech sector. Yet the industry is undergoing profound transformation. It remains a journalistic treasure trove, with vast untapped territory waiting to be explored and reported on.
If you share the author’s reflections and wish to gain a deeper understanding of the mechanics and nuances behind our food systems, or if you’re looking to access more firsthand insights into agriculture, you are welcome to join Foodthink’s Food and Agriculture Media Workshop in early September. Foodthink will bring together journalists who have long covered food, farming, and the environment to share their approaches and insights. The author of this piece will also be on hand to join the discussion.
Editor: Auntie Xiong