On January 7, at the year-end dividend meeting held at the demonstration base for under-forest economy in Xiaoping Town, Chenxi County, more than 100 villagers from Pingli Village and Shuangshui Village received the first “big gift package” of the new year: payment for their work in a local konjac cultivation base.
In 2024, Huaihua has earnestly implemented General Secretary Xi Jinping’s important discourse on work concerning agriculture, rural affairs and farmers, consistently prioritizing the increase of farmers’ income as the central task of the “three rural issues”. In the first three quarters, the city’s per capita disposable income for rural residents ranked first in Hunan Province, with an expected annual growth rate of 7.0%, placing it on the top-ranking position in the province.
To further ensure the effective implementation of relevant measures, Huaihua has formulated Seven Measures to Promote Income Growth among Low-Income Rural Population, optimized the consultation mechanism for promoting farmers’ income, and incorporated the work into the assessment of the efficiency of consolidating and expanding poverty alleviation achievements and of rural revitalization strategies.
Industrial development drives prosperity for the people. Huaihua is focused on building a “5+10” modern industrial system, primarily developing traditional Chinese medicine, seed industry, and food production chains. The city has added two national leading agricultural enterprises, two provincial modern agricultural industry parks, and 41 above-scale agricultural product processing enterprises. It has successfully registered the collective trademark for the regional brand “Huai Xiang Huai Pin”, with brand values of Jietan tea, Mayang citrus, and Qianyang sugar orange exceeding 3 billion yuan each. Leveraging the Huaihua International Land Port as a strategic pivot, the city has promoted the outward-oriented development of the agricultural industry, achieving agricultural product exports of 1.4 billion yuan, an increase of 180%, which is the highest growth rate in the province.
Employment is the greatest livelihood issue. Huaihua has been vigorously developing labor-intensive industries such as luggage and leather goods industry, creating employment for 15,000 people with an average income increase of approximately 4,000 yuan. The city has established a sound mechanism for labor cooperation, skills training, labor branding, and supporting returned entrepreneurs, facilitating the transfer employment of 41,000 rural laborers and placing 23,000 people in rural public welfare positions. In total, 447 employment assistance workshops have been built, employing 5,055 rural laborers; 2,356 entrepreneurship projects were implemented, resulting in 14,000 new entrepreneurial entities. Additionally, 360,000 individuals, who have been lifted out poverty, have maintained stable employment, with 336 work-relief programs benefiting 65,000 people. With all above-mentioned achievements, Huaihua was selected as the host of the provincial meeting for the promotion of high-quality and sufficient employment.
To further highlight empowerment through reform, Huaihua has vigorously advanced the construction of the property rights transfer and trading system. The city’s rural property rights trading center has begun operations, completing 35 transactions with a total transaction volume of 125 million yuan. Huaihua has been included among the first batch of national pilot areas for realizing the value of ecological products and is the only city-level “Xianglin Carbon Bill” application zone in the province. Jingzhou County has established the province’s first ecological product value realization platform, enabling intra-provincial trading of forestry carbon bills for the first time. Tongdao County has launched the province’s first natural asset package and issued forest ecosystem carbon credit certificates and forestry carbon vouchers. Zhijiang’s water area operation rights and Mayang’s water extraction rights have leveraged nearly 2 billion yuan in water ecological value loans. Furthermore, the city has actively been promoting eight new models for developing village collective economies, such as full-industrial chain hosting and collective purchasing of agricultural materials. It has successfully included 140 villages that received key financial support from central and provincial governments for collective economic projects, contributing to an increase of 6 million yuan in village collective income and benefiting over 250,000 people.
The city has continued to promote the implementation of various assistance policies, ensuring that subsidies such as pensions, minimum living allowances, disability allowances, and nutritional support for rural compulsory education students are distributed without omissions. Special emphasis is placed on enhancing the training of income assessment investigators for farmers, ensuring thorough checks and re-verification of income for key rural populations, with the aim of achieving comprehensive and accurate statistical reporting.
(Translated by Yang Hong)