Business Story: Evolution Of Sanya Mango

This spring is a "warm spring" for mangoes in Sanya. The hillsides on the sunny side are covered with golden mangoes. This year is another bumper year.

On March 20, in the official live broadcasting room of Taobao special edition, Du Haitao, the host of mango satellite TV, took Tao Ma as a guest to introduce Sanya mango to fans on the platform of "source good goods" as the source brother of Taobao special edition. Within an hour, 105 tons of mango were robbed, equivalent to the annual output of 200 mu of local orchards.

In fact, Sanya mango is the fastest growing variety of tropical fruit production in recent years, accounting for more than 90% of the fruits out of the island in Sanya City. It is one of the main sources of income for farmers in Sanya, and is also a pillar industry for Sanya farmers to increase their income, which directly drives the people out of poverty and become rich.

According to the synchronous data of Sanya Agricultural Bureau and Sanya mango Association, the total area of mango planting in Sanya reached 378900 mu, involving more than 15200 farmers, accounting for 54% of Hainan Province (702900 mu) and 14.6% of the national (2597200 mu).

However, even with a long planting history, superior regional position and huge industrial scale, Sanya mango industry has been plagued by the lack of branding and "relying on heaven". After several generations of farmers' changes, most of the local people in Sanya are not planting mango by themselves, but looking for contracts for fruit trees.

The hidden worries behind the annual income of one million

It's not a dream to grow mangoes for millions a year.

A local fruit grower in Sanya told the 21st century economic report: "generally speaking, the price of contracting a mango tree is between 120 yuan and 150 yuan. In normal years, the net profit of a mango tree can reach about 250 yuan. However, large farmers generally contract 4000-5000 Mu at a time, which is quite profitable. It is normal to earn one million yuan per year, but the risk of price fluctuation is also very clear Obviously. If there is a storm in the harvest time, the loss will be heavy. Mango is usually planted on the sunny side of the hillside. Mango trees like to dry, and when there is too much rain, it is not conducive to the growth of mango trees

Sanya mango's advantage lies in the winter market. Around the Spring Festival holiday, with the increasing number of tourists, the local mango market also ushered in the golden period. However, small and medium-sized fruit growers often need to rely on wholesalers for door-to-door purchase, and the intermediate process is complicated and greatly affected by the weather.

In the centralized listing of mango, wholesalers often collude to lower the price, "if the fruit is not picked, it will be overcooked. If it is picked, there will be a risk that it will not be sold. Finally, all kinds of price reduction measures will be taken." Yao Jiannan, a 26 year old second generation farmer, told the 21st century economic reporter. However, after the Spring Festival, mango prices have the risk of huge fluctuations, and serious cases may be cut off.

Moreover, with the implementation of the free trade agreement (FTA), tropical fruits from Southeast Asian countries have entered China's market with low taxes. Many Chinese enterprises are also looking for cheaper land and manpower in Thailand, Myanmar and other tropical climate countries, directly weakening the price advantage of Sanya mango in the market. In addition, due to the special geographical location of Hainan Island, fruit growers are often worried about the "disaster from heaven". Typhoon and other climate disasters often devour all the fruit farmers' harvest.

For fruit growers, fertilization, dressing, pruning, bagging and picking all require manual labor, especially in the final picking process, "the annual labor cost is 300000". At this time of year, Sanya has become the peak of labor force. In Northeast China, Guizhou and Sichuan Migrant workers from all over the city are waiting for fruit growers and buyers to come to solicit workers in front of shops on the edge of Yazhou city. It's a market in short supply. Nie Zongqing, a fruit grower in Ya Prefecture of Sanya, told reporters in the 21st century economic report that local people do not do such hard work. They are basically outsiders. It's not good for outsiders. Before, it was settled by the day, but it was not cost-effective. Later, they all became paid according to their work, "picking about 30 cents a catty." The workers are also more active, and he doesn't have to be angry to urge the workers to do it. At most, he asks more workers when he is in a hurry.

The market is different every year, the harvest is not necessarily, but 2021 is obviously a good harvest year. It is understood that Nie Zongqing and two other relatives work together to take care of 10000 fruit trees. "The output of each tree is about 100-150 Jin. If we go according to the current market, we can get a net income of more than one million in a year."

Nie Zongqing recalled to reporters that 36 years ago, he moved with his parents' generation from Fujian to Sanya and opened up wasteland with the most hardworking generation. "At that time, it was wasteland, and no one wanted it. Village cadres pointed out that the mountain was yours and that mountain was his. The land was not so valuable at that time. Our family has planted 10000 mango trees early, including Guifei, Tainong, Jinhuang and other varieties. Among them, Tainong accounts for the largest proportion, accounting for 40%

Nie Zongqing said that when they first planted mangoes, they carried their own shoulder poles to the market to sell them. Later, they drove to the stall to sell them. At that time, it was hard to grow and sell mangoes. In the next decade or so, it will become some buyers who come to collect the goods. For Nie Zongqing, it saves a lot of effort, but at the same time, there are also price sacrifices. "Sometimes the price given by the boss (the buyer) is not high."

Especially in 2020, after the outbreak of the epidemic, the mango in Sanya can't go out and consumers can't come in. The path of carrying the shoulder pole to sell by themselves and the buyer's door-to-door collection are blocked, and the purchasers can't help it. Finally, through e-commerce, live broadcast and other new channels to sell mango, which eased the problem of unsalable, opened a new way of mango sales. Nie Zongqing said that judging from the current situation, this year's situation will be much better than last year, and the current price can be 20% higher than that in 2020.

The collision of new and old fruit growers

At the beginning of 2020, the epidemic situation directly brought Sanya mango market into the cold winter, and the sales were nearly completely blocked, which accelerated the pace of reform of traditional sales channels. Among them, the post-90s new farmers also played an important role as "industry colliders".

Wang Hui, a 30-year-old second-generation farmer, recalled to the 21st century economic reporter: "because of the relatively low cost of automobile transportation, in the past, our mango mainly relied on traditional offline channels for distribution. My father Wang naibao is a native of Sanya. In the village, all the local people in Sanya have left their old business. Only my father insists on planting mango. The main products planted at home are high-end mango trees with 50000 mango trees. The main varieties are Tainong and Guifei. When I first proposed to be an online channel, I didn't understand it. He thought I was not doing my job. But after the epidemic last year, he also began to understand the importance of online channel. At present, our orchard online channel has reached 40% of the sales share. "

In fact, in Sanya, a unique phenomenon is that with the popularity of mango, the mango industry has become a high return industry, and more and more young people are returning to their hometown to become new farmers. The biggest difference between their parents and their parents is that they have begun to contact such new elements as e-commerce, live broadcasting and community to increase the income of the industry, and even save the industry when it is in danger.

Wang Hui is one of the typical examples. Different from their father's old fruit growers' specialty and their father's obstinacy, their generation can avoid their own shortcomings, cooperate with others, and then make use of their advantages to do business. Wang Hui chose to sell and integrate resources.

According to his introduction, mango trees usually have a five-year cycle. He resigned as a fruit farmer five years ago, just in time for the current Sanya mango market to heat up, which is a bit accurate. On October 29, 2013, Wang Hui and his father Wang naibao established a mango Planting Farmers' professional cooperative. At present, it is the largest farmer professional cooperative in Yacheng Town, Baogang, Meishan and Zhenhai areas. It has 23 members, and employs 2 agronomists with technical titles, 2 soil testing formula personnel and 5 management personnel. The cooperative has played a significant role in the local area, leading farmers from Baogang, Meishan, Yacheng to Sanya to plant mango on the road to prosperity.

In fact, Wang Hui also found that many young people around him began to give up their jobs in other places and go back to their hometown to plant mangoes or engage in related work.

Because of the good work, Wang Hui also pulled a small company that used to do automobile business together two years ago to cooperate. Wang Hui said that since the past two years, he has also had a voice in orchard management, which has brought the orchard a close tie with his father.

The results of the game between the second generation mango growers and their parents are gradually becoming clear.

Huo Donghua, head of the Rural Work Office of Sanya Municipal Party committee, told reporters of the 21st century economic report that "the most important problem of Sanya mango lies in the intermediate sales link. The middlemen not only maliciously depress the price of the common people, but also raise the terminal market price of mango. With some fruit farmers starting to access the direct supply from the production areas, after reducing the intermediate links, the fruit farmers can have more There's a lot of room for revenue. "

Not only that, the mode of direct supply from producing areas also improves the accessibility efficiency of the front-end situation to consumers, making the whole link of mango production and transportation transparent, so that consumers can buy and eat at ease.

However, despite the advantages, the mode of direct supply from production area is not without resistance at all.

According to the statement on the Internet that "the sales volume of mango industry e-commerce platform only accounts for 40%, and the remaining 60% still belongs to the traditional sales mode, and this pattern will last for a long time", Peng Qidun, President of Sanya mango Association, told reporters that at present, the logistics cost is indeed a big pain point under the direct supply mode of production area, and the air transportation cost is far higher than that of land transportation. To solve this problem, we still need to make multiple efforts power.

In fact, it is not only the mode of transportation, but also the size of the box, the filling materials in the box and the grasp of the product maturity will affect the cost. In the case of low logistics costs, mango quality may be damaged, but because the cost will ultimately be reflected in the price, it also has corresponding market space, but it will be in a disadvantage position in quality control.

Wang Hui told the 21st century economic reporter: "our orchard online channel is mainly through high-end products to make a reputation, but from the market feedback, land transportation is still cheaper, and the cost savings are more important for a broader market environment. This is also the reason why offline channels will still dominate for a long time. "

The road to brand

In 2018, "Sanya mango" successfully passed the expert evaluation on the protection of geographical indication products by the General Administration of quality supervision, inspection and quarantine. This is its third "national" signboard after it was granted the geographical indication trademark of the State Administration for Industry and Commerce in 2012 and the agricultural product geographical indication registration of the Ministry of agriculture in 2015. The brand upgrading of Sanya mango is in progress.

In 2021, the regional public brand sales of Sanya commercial mangoes have reached 3.287 billion yuan, which have been successfully exported to more than 10 countries and regions such as Canada, Europe and Saudi Arabia. Sanya mangoes are basically sold in large and medium-sized cities in China. In order to further expand its sales and promote the transformation and upgrading of its brand, Sanya mango has set up 18 external offices nationwide, mainly responsible for the collection of sales and market information.

However, there are still some difficulties in the industrial development. At present, many state-owned mango planting bases in Sanya have a history of 20 years, and they are slightly backward in soil improvement and green control. Good mangoes are planted. It is the key to strengthen the ecological orchard construction and make the orchard form a green cycle.

At the same time, more mature trade systems often have a standardized international reference price. Peng Qidun told reporters that at present, mango prices are still determined by the market. Sanya mango's goal is to promote the future pricing power to change from market pricing to association or company pricing, so as to ensure that fruit farmers, enterprises, logistics, consumers and other parties can benefit.

In addition to standardized production, packaging and post harvest processing are also a major way to upgrade the brand. In the future, Sanya mango packaging cold chain needs to further improve, build more standard chemical plants, and introduce automatic production lines, so as to reduce costs and improve product quality and quality standards.

What needs to be added is that when it comes to cost, Huo Donghua also proposes that the e-commerce platform should help Sanya mango to integrate retail investors. Only with the intensive scale, can they be qualified to "bargain" with logistics parties and master more resources, so as to minimize the cost. Peng Qidun also believes that Sanya mango should be benchmarked with foreign countries to create the form of "leading enterprises + farmers". On the premise of ensuring quality, Sanya mango should expand its volume with the help of Sanya's own flow to form a unicorn brand.

However, in terms of brand building, the most inseparable is the combination relationship with C-end customers and consumers.

Under the background that c2m e-commerce platform is hot online, making good use of its live broadcast window and 5g window can directly present Sanya mango's advantages such as geographical location and planting environment to consumers more truly and directly, so as to improve its brand image at the C-end, ultimately improve sales volume, sales speed and efficiency, and form a virtuous circle.

It is worth mentioning that Huo Donghua believes that in order to refine the brand of Sanya mango, on the one hand, it is no longer limited to the production of fresh fruits, but to consider the deep processing of mangoes, and the use of lower quality mangoes; on the other hand, the cultivation of new varieties is also very important. "Our mango varieties in recent years are basically limited to Guifei, Tainong, aomang, etc., and the changes are not very big. But if we want to develop, we need to innovate, and the purpose should be clear. For example, we can improve the imperial concubine for women's taste of sweet and sour taste; for the side effects of mango fire, we can improve Taiwan farmers. " Intern Ding Mingyue reports from Sanya

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