County Heads, Women's Federations' Presidents Promote Agricultural Products via Livestreaming Shows

Nearly 75,000 kilograms of pears were sold in just half an hour on an e-commerce platform through a livestreaming show on March 31 in Dangshan, a county in East China's Anhui Province.

Dangshan County, located in the place where Anhui borders the provinces of Jiangsu, Shandong and Henan is known as the hometown of crisp pears in China. It grows pears featuring juicy taste and high nutritional value. 

The local impoverished families have shaken off poverty and increased the income through planting the pears. However, 400,000 tonnes of pears encountered poor sales because of the standstill in the logistics industry due to the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak.

Learning that many rural women and women entrepreneurs were facing difficulties in the sales of pears, the local government and women's federation tried many ways to help them out. 

Yang Jinsong, President of the Women's Federation of Suzhou City, in Anhui Province, took the initiative to be a host of a livestreaming show designed for promoting Dangshan pears, which were produced by a local fruit trading company led by woman entrepreneur Wu Yanyan.

Yang introduced the history and culture of Dangshan County, the planting process of the Dangshan pear and the three ways it can be eaten, attracting many netizens to watch the broadcast.

Yang also introduced how the women's federation facilitated poverty alleviation during the live streaming, enhancing the netizens' understanding of the federation's role in lifting local impoverished people out of poverty. Many netizens gave a thumbs-up to her and placed orders for pears. 

Like Yang, more and more female officials around the country have used the livestreaming platforms to publicize women's federations' work in poverty alleviation and rural revitalization, and help local farmers to promote products since mid-to-late February. 

The officials of Women's Federation of Zhenjiang City in East China's Jiangsu Province organized a livestreaming show on March 20 for Fu Yuxiang, an entrepreneur who led local villagers to get rid of poverty and become rich, to sell her fresh tea. 

The federation invited local tea experts to show how to select and taste tea and recommend the high quality of the fresh tea to online followers during the show.

Wearing a suit of red Hanfu, or Han-style costumes, Liang Huimin, head of Caoxian County in East China's Shandong Province, promoted the culture of the traditional clothing and helped sell nearly 5,000 costumes and related products online. More than 4.8 million netizens watched the live broadcast.

"The live streaming not only helped enterprises find a good market and accelerate the resumption of work, but also publicized the Hanfu of Caoxian County to more people," said Liang.

Cai Linlin, Vice-President of the Women's Federation of Zhenjiang City, in Jiangsu Province, said that the city's women's federation has been working on a themed project in which influential women with specialties were invited to impart agricultural technologies, product marketing and corporate management knowledge to farmers, making their own efforts in the resumption of production and the implementation of the rural revitalization strategy.

In the past 30-plus days, presidents of the women's federations at the province, city, county and district levels in the provinces of Zhejiang, Jiangsu, Anhui and Fujian, and female county heads of Shandong, Yunnan, Shaanxi, Guangdong and Heilongjiang provinces have joined the promotion events via livestreaming platforms for promoting unsalable agricultural products due to the impact of the COVID-19 epidemic. The products included pawpaw, loquat, kiwi, citrus and rice wine.

A netizen said that the federations' participation in such livestreaming shows has demonstrated the resolute determination and the down-to-earth style of the local governments and relevant departments to bring more concrete benefits to the people.

Deng Rui, head of Hekou County, in Southwest China's Yunnan Province, stressed that the livestreaming events have made it clear to local farmers that governments are dedicating to assisting them and strengthening their faith in the expansion of the planting scale and the improvement of their livelihoods in the future.

(Source: China Women's News/Translated and edited by Women of China)