URUMQI: From age 25 to 40, Mijit Yasinjan, an ethnic Uygur, worked as a second-hand car dealer in Shanghai, more than 5,000 km from his hometown.
Azgan Village where Mijit was born is in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, northwest China. For decades, the young people of this Uygur village in Suntag Township of Artux City have traveled to the developed areas on China’s eastern coast in large numbers to do business, for example, engaging in the wholesale of fabrics or running restaurants. Today, among the 4,127 villagers, more than 400 are still working and living in the eastern region.
But more and more people, like Mijit, opt to come back. “My hometown is doing well now, and my income is higher than before,” he said.
Mijit continues his used-car trading business in Artux, while he also runs a shop at a local fig-trading market and owns a convenience store in Azgan.
Artux is known as “China’s Home of Figs,” and Azgan features more than 73 hectares of fig trees, accounting for about 80 percent of the village’s total arable land. However, given figs can only be stored for one to two days at room temperature, it is difficult to transport them to locations far away. When in season from May to October, figs can only bring in meager profits; moreover, the fruit is not considered a delicacy locally, so selling it close to home won’t result in big business.
However, the retail price of fresh figs in big cities like Beijing and Shanghai is much higher, up to $2 each. In 2018, Artux was enrolled in the National Rural E-Commerce Comprehensive Demonstration Project, which aimed at accelerating rural e-commerce. Air-conditioned preservation technology was introduced to the area, extending the storage period of fresh figs from the previous one or two days to one or two weeks. This gave Artux’ specialty the opportunity to be sold nationwide.
And that wasn’t the end of it. Deep-processed products such as dried figs and jam have blown the market wide open. One hectare of orchard can now generate about 150,000 yuan ($22,200) in income. In 2019, the integrated development of the fig industry increased the incomes of 338 impoverished households, and the following year Azgan bid farewell to absolute poverty overall.
But the eradication of absolute poverty by no means marked the end of rural development in China. What really drew Mijit, and others, back to their hometown from more economically developed cities were the broader development prospects and ever better living environment in the villages.
–The Daily Mail-Beijing
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