Farmers in Jinxiang, Shandong Province firmly hold the title of the world's garlic king. Alibaba International Station's garlic exports increased fivefold in 2020

The world looks to China for garlic, China looks to Shandong for garlic, and Shandong looks to Jinxiang for garlic.

Jinxiang County is a county under the jurisdiction of Jining City, Shandong Province. It is located at the junction of Shandong and Jiangsu provinces in southwest Shandong. It was established as a county during the Eastern Han Dynasty and is a famous garlic town.

It is reported that Chinese garlic accounts for about 80 % of the world's total exports , and Shandong Jinxiang's exports account for about 70 % of the country's total .

Jining Youlian Food is one of the representative enterprises in Jinxiang. Its founder Si Chonglei switched to garlic business in 2005. At that time, it was common to see garlic in Jinxiang rotting in the fields like "cabbage" or being collected at a price of 8 cents per pound, and the income of garlic farmers was very meager.

"I felt sad that the garlic from my hometown was being wasted like this," Si Chonglei recalled. He started the export business the year he changed his career because he "saw the business opportunity of opening up the garlic export market."

[Photo: Fresh garlic is being dug from the fields of Jinxiang garlic farmers.]

Si Chonglei chose to settle in Alibaba International Station and export overseas with the help of the cross-border e-commerce channels built by Alibaba. Last year, the global epidemic was serious, and Si Chonglei received a significant increase in orders from the International Station, and the number of customers increased by 40% compared with the previous year, with sales of more than 40 million US dollars throughout the year .

Not only Jining Youlian Food, Alibaba International Station data shows that in 2020 , the platform's fresh garlic exports increased nearly five times, ranking first among agricultural products. The transaction volume of the entire agricultural industry also increased by 183% year-on-year compared to 2019 , higher than the 101 % growth rate of the entire platform.

"The International Station has brought a great increase in China's agricultural product exports." Si Chonglei said that since the International Station began to become popular in Jining, surrounding garlic farmers or agricultural product merchants have also begun to sell online. There are about 100 local companies doing garlic export business through the International Station.

Cheng Yuanxin's company was one of the first local merchants to join Alibaba International Station. With the help of Alibaba's cross-border e-commerce platform, he truly realized the advancement from farmer to farmer merchant and then to farmer entrepreneur.

More than 30 years ago, Cheng Yuanxin, who had just started his business, suffered a lot of scorn and humiliation. Some people even laughed at him, "If you can sell garlic in this small street, I will respect you."

Cheng Yuanxin made up his mind without saying anything, "I will not only sell the garlic in this small street, but also sell it abroad."

[Photo: Every day, the first thing Cheng Yuanxin’s employees do when they get to work is to open Alibaba International Station and look at foreign inquiries .]

As early as 2017 , Cheng Yuanxin's company's sales revenue was close to 1 billion yuan, and the agricultural products from the fields were sold well in 35 countries . Looking back on the past, Cheng Yuanxin lamented that before the Internet, it was difficult to sell agricultural products, not to mention foreign customers. After 18 years of cooperation with Alibaba International Station , 70 % of the customers were found on the International Station.

Digitalization is a speedboat in the foreign trade industry, helping Chinese agricultural products to go abroad. Since 2014 , Alibaba has integrated more than 20 agricultural businesses to build a digital agricultural assistance system. Among them, Alibaba International Station uses a new digital foreign trade model to promote the export of Chinese agricultural products to 100 countries and regions around the world.

Today, the hometown of garlic can generate at least 3,000 yuan in revenue per acre for garlic farmers through the online expansion of Alibaba International Station, allowing Shandong farmers to remain firmly on the throne of the world's garlic king despite the epidemic .

Alibaba International Station