Will a Village Party Secretary’s Eco-Farming Initiative Succeed? | Grandma Kouzi
I. A Village Party Secretary, Out of Nowhere
I was taken slightly aback.
It was 23 February 2022. I remember the date so clearly because, since I first arrived in Eren Valley in 2021, he has been the only person to respond to me in quite that way.
For me, since settling at Woren Valley, my appetite for the outside world has completely vanished. I’ve narrowed my focus entirely to my own patch of earth. So I brought up the idea of ditching chemical fertilisers, pesticides and herbicides, emphasising that ecological farming is what truly matters…
Right then, out of the blue, a voice cut into our conversation. The neighbour’s guest, who had been standing with his back to us, suddenly turned around and pitched in: “Ecological farming? I’d like to give it a go.”
He brought his teacup over and took a seat at our table, and that was how we were introduced to Fan Hanquan.
When he introduced himself, I was taken aback all over again: he was actually a village party secretary.
By then, I had been at Woren Valley for under a year, and my outlook had shifted considerably. In the beginning, I was keen to talk about ecological farming with anyone who would listen, insisting that clean soil, air and water cannot exist in isolation and require collective effort. But I soon stopped bringing it up. It wasn’t that my convictions had wavered; I was simply exhausted. The truth was, speaking up changed nothing, so I might as well keep quiet.
True to form, it wasn’t long before Fan Hanquan dropped a “but” into the conversation. As soon as I heard it, I felt that familiar sense of deflation set in; a “but” rarely precedes anything encouraging: “Ecological farming might be wonderful, but we just can’t pull it off.”
Fan Hanquan, however, was different. He laid out a few of the practical challenges first, then added: “But I’d still like to give it a try.”
II. The Vanishing Village
I agreed to go because he was keen to trial ecological farming. One old friend hoped to put down roots, drawn by Meicuntou’s promise of a full suite of support measures and robust legal safeguards for newcomers. Another friend from Xiamen was captivated by Fan Hanquan’s suggestion to mirror the “Grain Owner System” practised by farmers in Taiwan—a model of ecological farming where farmland is contracted through advance purchases of the rice harvest.
Fan Hanquan has never farmed himself and knows little of the craft. He left home straight after junior high school, eventually settling down and building a life elsewhere. His role as a “flying secretary” (serving from 2005 to 2009, and again from 2015 to the present)—one who rarely visits the village—stems from a simple, stark reality: a lack of people. There was nobody left to take on the secretary role, and barely anyone willing to remain in the village at all.
Meicuntou is the most remote and geographically largest administrative village in Liancheng County. Though its official register lists over a thousand names, fewer than four hundred people actually reside there. Opportunities are scarce in the deep mountains, leaving only the last generation of farmers to tend the land. As the elderly population dwindles, the village faces the prospect of vanishing altogether. Fan Hanquan puts it bluntly: “village extinction.”
Most of the traditional Hakka timber-frame houses lay empty. In this tiny village sat a disproportionately large village committee building, alongside a two-storey structure and a sprawling playground that once served as the local school. The policy of consolidating villages and merging schools had only hastened the village’s decline. The quiet mountain village was undoubtedly picturesque, but to our old friends, accustomed to bouncing between Yunnan and Hainan or travelling from Xining to Tibet, it clearly held little appeal.
Partners interested in ecological cultivation and the rice procurement and land leasing model grew uneasy at the sight of pesticide bottles scattered by the fields, pointing out that the scheme strictly bans chemical fertilisers, pesticides, and herbicides. It was evident that Fan Hanquan was disheartened, yet he still said, “Even if we can’t make the rice procurement and land leasing arrangement work, I still want to give it a try. I’ll use my own family’s land and let my father do the growing.”
But Fan’s father worried, “Without chemical fertilisers, pesticides, or herbicides, the rice won’t grow.” I have heard this too many times, especially from farmers of his generation. They came of age just as chemical fertilisers and pesticides arrived, hybrid varieties were introduced, and herbicides became commonplace. Yields soared, living standards improved, and they enjoyed a better life than the previous generation, managing to send their children—Fan Hanquan’s generation—to cities for even better prospects. Their farming has been steeped in chemicals, and their daily meals lost among bouillon cubes and seasoning packets. This has bred an almost superstitious faith in synthetic inputs, a mindset arguably more damaging than the physical toll these substances take on the body.
Human agriculture spans tens of thousands of years; chemical fertilisers and pesticides have only been in China for about fifty years. How could crops possibly fail to grow without them? People often say that those who don’t farm don’t understand the hardship, but I work the soil myself, relying on the earth to feed my family.
Speaking of how today’s high-yield hybrid strains are ill-suited to ecological farming, I introduced them to Jin Yan from Shanghang’s Jinboyuan Farm. Having practised ecological agriculture for a decade in a mountain village at a similar thousand-metre elevation on Meihua Mountain, what Jinboyuan has achieved, Meicuntou can certainly replicate.
Fan’s father smiled but said nothing. I recognised this as merely traditional Hakka courtesy. When Fan Hanquan replied, “I’ll get in touch right away,” I also smiled without comment. Most likely, it was just polite talk.
III. Ecological Tribute Rice: What Will the Yield Be?
Come autumn, Fan Hanquan delivered his harvest. The rice was undeniably delicious, albeit modest in yield. Fan had even purchased a handy land-measuring tool to calculate the output precisely, clocking in at 296 jin of milled rice per mu. While the yield was certainly not high, it proved enough to persuade both Fan’s father and the onlookers.
Later, the Woren Valley area also planted the same variety of tribute rice. Over 190 square metres, the harvest brought in 154 jin of paddy. Factoring in a 70% milling yield, this equates to 370 jin of milled rice per mu. Add in the second crop due three months later, and the total will comfortably clear 400. It seems I genuinely have a knack for growing rice.
Meicun Tou’s initial foray into ecological farming was impressive, but what truly struck me was Fan Hanquan’s “integrity mechanism”.
In Taiwan, the traditional model relies on “consumer trust paired with producer self-regulation”. Fan Hanquan, however, devised his own workaround: leveraging Wi-Fi coverage, he mounted cameras at the field edges, enabling plot adopters to keep a 24-hour watch via their smartphones. It’s effectively an “integrity mechanism founded on the assumption of distrust”.
I was disappointed that the “adopt-a-plot, buy-the-rice” scheme failed to take off in 2022; I feared Fan Hanquan might lose steam. Fortunately, the experiment pressed on, even expanding in scale. By 2023, although the consumer model remained unimplemented, the village collective had consolidated 50 mu of terraced fields from scattered farmers for centralised restoration. They openly welcomed public scrutiny and pledged to forgo chemical fertilisers, pesticides, and herbicides. Using his mobile monitoring system, Fan Hanquan gave us a tour of the fields under rehabilitation—the very stretch lying behind the village committee building.
On this occasion, with the village collective funding the operation and hiring hands for extensive, low-intervention farming, the milled rice yield came to just over 100 jin per mu.
IV. There is No Turning Back from Ecological Farming
Though he started with no agricultural background, he gradually began discussing soil amendment, enzymes, EM microbes, and weighing up permaculture against Shomyo farming… He truly threw himself into it.
Unfortunately, neither Fan Hanquan nor Meicuntou has been particularly lucky. Various attempts fell short of expectations. In 2023, the village also hosted a fairly lively “Thousand-Person Hiking Festival”. However, I have little faith in such large-scale events. They tend to concentrate resources just to create a stir, generating almost no income for the village at the time and bringing no repeat visitors once the dust settles.
Fan Hanquan frequently mentions examples such as “specialist tourism revitalising mountain areas” or “outsiders breathing new life into historic villages”, hoping that an immense fortune might one day land squarely on Meicuntou. I’m familiar with many of these cases, having even visited a few. Beyond the undeniable scenery and the roll of the dice, there’s one vital ingredient: people. Yet Meicuntou’s greatest deficit is precisely that. With no population, no capital, no substance, and no opportunities, it’s caught in a vicious cycle.
Distance from educational and industrial hubs has effectively “pushed out” the locals. Fan Hanquan’s own life illustrates this: his business and family are based in Pengkou Town, nearer to the county seat and served by a high-speed rail station. Meanwhile, the village’s natural assets, tucked away in the deep mountains and largely unknown, have effectively “shut out” outsiders.
When old villages are revitalised, it’s always the newcomers who first establish a distinct character. They attract others like them, eventually drawing locals back and creating a virtuous cycle. The crux lies in securing that first wave of outsiders.
So, what can Meicuntou offer to draw outsiders in? By refusing chemical fertilisers, pesticides and herbicides to carve out a truly unspoiled patch of land, it might just attract fellow practitioners of ecological farming.
By 2024, those dozens of acres of reclaimed and detoxified land lay fallow once more. The village collective’s undertaking isn’t a decision for the branch secretary to make alone; keeping at it means continuing to operate at a loss. Renewing the lease while leaving the land fallow still incurs a loss, however minor, and is no lasting solution. Walking away means chemical fertilisers, pesticides and herbicides will inevitably stage a comeback. In short, for Meicuntou, ecological farming is a one-way street.
V. Can an ecological village break free from the “middle environment” predicament?
My patch at Evil Valley represents the tiniest sample of this “micro environment”. It’s a lifestyle farm free from commercial pressures, operating at the most modest scale—just a few acres. Progress is encouraging; reaching a point of self-sufficiency and living quietly on our own terms should only be a year away. But herbicide drift is impossible to fully guard against. Sprays are applied along the nearby road, and even neighbouring fields that have been abandoned for over a decade are still treated.
The Zou Jinyan I introduced to Fan Hanquan runs a hundred-acre family estate with sixty to seventy acres of woodland and around twenty acres of arable land. Both the farm’s ecosystem and its business operations are gradually finding their stride. Jinyan’s main headache, however, comes from the large-scale vegetable plots nearby. Fujian’s summers are notoriously scorching, making the hottest months an off-season for vegetables. Thanks to its higher altitude, this area escapes the worst of the summer heat, which has led the large commercial veg patches in neighbouring regions to go all out with chemical fertilisers, pesticides and herbicides.
Another friend, Sister Huang, operates in Xianren Valley in Jiaoyang, Shanghang County, where she tends to over a hundred acres of arable land alongside several hundred acres of woodland. She invested in a full suite of heavy machinery—rotary tillers, bulldozers, and wood chippers—and has effectively turned the sprawling valley into her own self-sufficient kingdom. Yet every time I visit, I find clashes breaking out. It’s not that Sister Huang is looking for a fight; rather, people keep turning up to pick quarrels or make false claims. Many locals see the farm as an easy target, desperate to carve out a slice for themselves… The trouble doesn’t just come from individuals staging relentless, shifting campaigns of harassment; even the local town and village authorities occasionally complicate matters. If Sister Huang weren’t naturally resilient and well-versed in the law, she would have been forced to pack up and leave long ago.
Eren Valley is a pocket-sized farm with land investments in the hundred-thousand-yuan range; Jinbo Farm sits in the multi-million range; and Xianren Valley has seen investments surpassing ten million yuan. All three are financially self-sustaining. Yet no matter how well-run the operations are behind closed doors, each faces its own ‘middle-environment dilemma’.
I harbour no illusions about the broader landscape: industrial agriculture is an unstoppable force. Yet not everyone wishes to jump onto that fast lane—Sister Huang, Jinyan, and I certainly don’t. A truly progressive era should afford people real choices and allow them to find a stable, supportive ‘middle environment’ where they can put down roots.
In Fan Hanquan’s telling, Meicuntou is perfect in every way, though I suspect a touch of local pride colours his account. To my eyes, it’s fairly unremarkable. But if we can cultivate the kind of ‘middle environment’ that small-scale ecological farmers truly need—stripping out chemical fertilisers, pesticides and herbicides on the hardware side, and providing grassroots leadership from a dedicated party secretary like Fan Hanquan on the software side—then what seems ordinary can become something quite extraordinary.
At Jinbo Farm, where conditions are similar, ecological farming has done more than draw visitors to the fields; it has attracted the kind of people who can actually shift the village forward. Guests who initially dropped by for a quick summer retreat have slowly turned into old friends who return year after year. What began as simple ‘from soil to table’ picking experiences has blossomed into a calendar of events spanning from rice-planting festivals to harvest celebrations, alongside birdwatching, botanical specimen workshops, environmental education sessions, and miniature bonsai crafting. The flow of new visitors keeps growing, while long-term supporters grow ever more loyal. Later, Jinyan partnered with the Dawu Academy, which focuses on rural revitalisation, and the Xiamen ‘Small & Beautiful Action School’, introducing even more activities. Their presence drew further interest, inspiring local villagers to launch homestays and take on hospitality roles.
This is exactly why I suggested to Fan Hanquan that we establish an ‘eco-village’: to bring together the people who will help rebuild and revitalise Meicuntou. With the right community in place, the next phase of possibilities can finally begin.
VI. Offering Personal Land to “Build a Nest and Attract the Phoenix”
So why hadn’t I stumbled upon Meicuntou during my search?
To be honest, Fan Hanquan is the only village party secretary I have ever befriended. I have traditionally kept my distance from village secretaries. After decades of grassroots charity work and social surveys, I consider myself fortunate if we can simply stay out of each other’s way. This isn’t out of prejudice. Grassroots bodies are primarily focused on maintaining stability; they aim to avoid trouble rather than chase achievements. I completely understand their preference for avoiding unnecessary complications.
“I don’t mind the paperwork or the trouble. If you’re willing to come and practice ecological farming, I’ll provide whatever support you need. As long as you qualify for subsidies, we’ll handle the liaison with the government ourselves,” Fan Hanquan stated repeatedly. He promised to do everything in his power to ensure newcomers receive the same treatment as locals and have full access to state subsidies. “If we provide good support, people will come, and the village will survive.”
– Meicuntou Village –
◉ 2 : Each household will receive one mu of land and one room, free of charge for three years. The land comes from Fan Hanquan’s own fields. The accommodation is a room in the village committee building, complete with a shared kitchen, bathroom, toilet, broadband internet, and utilities.
◉ 3 : Should more land be required, tenants may rent the prepared terraced paddy fields behind the primary school. These plots have road and water access, with rent capped at 100 yuan per mu.
◉ 4 : Upon renewal after three years, land rent will remain capped at 100 yuan per mu. Rent for idle courtyards will start from 3 yuan per square metre per year, with a maximum of 30 yuan.
◉ 5 : Additional applicants wishing to practice ecological farming and rent land or accommodation at Meicuntou will also benefit from these capped rates.
Finally, a straightforward call for applicants
Dr Qin Guoxin, our inaugural new villager under this initiative, brings over a decade of farming experience and has already settled in Meicuntou. There are two places remaining for the free land and housing programme. We welcome like-minded individuals sharing a passion for ecological agriculture to join us in building this new village community. Interested parties may contact Dr Qin directly at 18959029392 (phone or WeChat).
Editor: Wang Hao