E-commerce live streaming thrives in rural Beijing

Wang Dan (third from left) and some instructors of her e-commerce operation team.[Xinhua/Photo]

Live streaming is staged in the field

"Our vegetables are ripe and freshly picked and can be delivered immediately," said Sun Meijia, holding a basket of locally-produced organic tomatoes, with a big orchard of fruits and melons behind her. In her fourth year as a host at the Minong Family e-commerce platform, Sun has insisted on running live streaming in the fields.

Minong Family, located in Miyun district in northeast Beijing, started selling agricultural products using the "internet plus agriculture" model and has gradually formed a live e-commerce team, with Sun Meijia being one of the most influential hosts.

The Minong live streaming focuses on Miyun's local specialties, featuring a dazzling array of seasonal vegetables and fruits from various villages, free-range chicken eggs, and fresh fish from the Miyun reservoir. Each live session has seen 10% of the audience turned into new subscribers, with sales exceeding 2000 yuan.

Why  the live streaming is set up directly in the fields? Sun explained that standing in the fields gives her confidence and pride as a farmer. "I hope to get our high-quality produces known to more people," said Sun.

More people have access to live streaming

"I hope more and more farmers in my hometown will use smartphones to sell agricultural products." Motivated by her goal, the e-commerce entrepreneur Wang Dan took on the role of a "teacher."

As a certified senior lecturer recognized by the China Electronic Commerce Association, Wang designed her own course content, containing e-platform operation and sales skills. She has been conducting these training sessions for six years. To assist more people, Wang and her students established a teaching team. Till now, the team has trained over 10,000 peach farmers from 16 major peach-producing townships in Pinggu district in Beijing.

In 2019, Wang invested over ten million yuan in building an E-commerce platform for agricultural products from Pinggu district called Yiyun Zhenxuan, which improves public welfare through sales profits. Her passion for rural development has transformed her from a business owner to an e-commerce instructor, developing farmers’ live streaming-related skills to increase their income.

Live streaming revives cultural tourism

Zhang Hailong is a talented young entrepreneur who has returned to his hometown to start a business.

In 2016, Zhang created a cloud service platform that is designed for the online buying and claiming of sheep, as well as for the real-time monitoring and traceability. This novel method greatly improved the sheep sales of Zhang's family.

Also, the success of selling sheep on the e-platform allowed Zhang to exchange ideas with other young rural entrepreneurs, making him more aware of the significance of the Internet in rural industry revitalization.

In the following seven years, Zhang led his hometown's youth to the innovation of a new co-operation model that involves companies, villages and township management.

They implemented 78 agricultural, cultural, and rural tourist projects in 14 townships around the Pinggu area. One of the projects is live streaming, which serves as a window to promote the Pingu district’s cultural tourism brand as well as high-quality local agricultural and sideline products.

"Over the past three years, we have increased local people's income by more than 30 million yuan," said Zhang proudly.

Apart from platform-based e-commerce, Beijing's local agricultural products are also directly sold through WeChat mini-programs, group chats, short videos, live streaming, and so on, giving birth to more local operation teams. With constant iteration and rapid growth, there are more than 10,000 independent operation teams with different IPs.

Source: China News Service; trans-editing by Guo Yao