Making millions thanks to 75-year-old grape expert
Years ago, nobody could have imagined that little Dayu Village, in Jiading’s Malu Town, would one day generate more than 100 million yuan (US$14.6 million) a year from selling grapes, a figure that’s even a surprise for the local farmers.
Credit is due to 75-year-old Shan Chuanlun, who was transferred to Jiading’s Malu Town in 1980 to engage in the scientific planting and management of Malu grapes.
His story began in 1979 when Osaka and Shanghai became Friendship Cities. Shanghai decided to build a garden for growing fruit trees, vegetables and flowers as a “communication window” with the Japanese city. This “window” gave Shan a great opportunity to work with grapes.
Shan, a native of Shandong Province, came to Shanghai’s Nanhui District in 1976 to work as a technician. Four years later, recommended by a friend, Shan started to work in Jiading on promoting grapes plantation technology and new grapes species.
Shan and his colleague planted around 80 (53,333 square meters) of fruit trees and vines in the spring of 1981, among which were 2.2 of Jufeng grapes. That was the beginning of the Malu grape.
“Before 1982, most people including me were cautious about private property. One of my apprentices joked that if everyone undertook 30 land, we would become landlords,” said Shan. “However, I was afraid to accept this method at first. So when Jiading gave me land to contract, I was so surprised.”
Shan finally accepted the idea, and proposed three requirements — planting grapes only; hiring full-time farmers and marketing the fruit garden.
Shan unrooted peach trees and planted grape vines. He did so because growing grapes was the best way to operate a large company and make a profit.
In the following year, Shan expanded the area for grapes to 25 which resulted in a good harvest of 1,750 kilograms of grapes.
He published a paper on “Shanghai Agriculture and Technology” and “Digest of Chinese Fruit Tree Technology,” and then became promoted in Shanghai, Zhejiang and Jiangsu. In 1985, Jiading promoted to plant grapes and two years later, Jiading had 20,000 of grapes, while the countryside of Shanghai had 40,000 in total.
That was the time of no Internet, but everybody knew that selling grapes could earn money. Malu grapes became well known in neighboring cities, and farmers were coming to Jiading to learn how to plant grapes. Shan never refused to explain his methods to others.
“The grape brought us a lot of fortune before 1989. A 30-strong production team could get a 400,000-yuan bank account,” Shan recalled. The annual income of Jiading resident was only 1,000 yuan at that time and it was a big deal if someone was earning more than 10,000 yuan. Thirty teams earned more than 10,000 yuan a year in Dayu Village.
Unfortunately, the good times didn’t last long since everyone started to grow grapes, which resulted in prices dropping as supply exceeded demand.
At this critical moment, Jiading decided to launch a Malu Grape Research Center, gathering a scientific team together to deal with the problem. After the center was built in 1992 when Shan acted as the director, the center aimed to deal with two tasks to control the supply and explore scientific ways to cultivate grapes.
Everywhere in the country people were selling grapes. As a result, the institution drew up a plan to produce 1,500 kilograms of Jufeng grapes, half of the normal production. They also promoted grape-bagging technology at the same time.
“I went to Oasaka and Tokyo visiting Japan’s fruit garden,” said Shan. “We found that they started to use large greenhouses to grow vegetables. Then I drew the greenhouse on my notebook.” After going back to Jiading, Shan grew grapes in the vegetable greenhouse. After some failed experiments, Shan and his colleagues finally built the first daylighttype energy-conservative greenhouse in 1995.
Then, the institution tackled the difficulties one after the other, and cultivated more grape species. Tens of types had been introduced before the institution was built. After the institution was launched, they introduced a bunch of high-quality grapes from the US, Romania and Japan, Shan recalled. All these grapes eventually became popular in China.
When Shan paid a business trip to the city of Taixing in Jiangsu Province, he saw people selling “Malu Grapes” with a sticker on the fruit. But the truth was the real Malu grapes were sold only in Shanghai.
Shan created the “Chuanlun” brand back in Shanghai, and encouraged his neighbors to reregister their own brands in order to protect their product.
The Malu Grape Themed Park was initiated by Shan as well. “When we went to New Zealand to study, local people showed us their sheep yard and gave us a performance of shearing, which was fun. It suddenly came to my mind that why don’t we bring the city people to the grape garden in the countryside picking fruit and enjoying the fun,” said Shan.
`As a result, the Malu Grape Themed Park started to take shape in 2005 as an ecological and agriculture venue. Nowadays, the 500-mu grape park is not only for visitors to sightsee, but also to enjoy the fun of modern agriculture. Every weekend of August, the grape garden hosts a variety of activities, becoming one more interesting destination for youngsters in their spare time.
Shan is due many thanks for bringing such a pleasant park into being.