Sustainable ground
, 06-29-2018
An initiative started by a leading fast food company has transformed the way farmers in Yunnan source, manage and harvest truffles, Zhang Lei reports
Sixty-year-old Duan Chaowen, a forest ranger and head of Duanjia village in a remote area of Yunnan province, spends his days patrolling the mountains near his home in Yongbei town, Yongsheng county. In one valley, which he knows so well that he can practically retrace it from memory, lies a rare kind of black truffle.
Like many local villagers, Duan is a veteran wild truffle hunter. Despite his best efforts over the past two decades in harvesting the valuable fungus, he has been unable to maintain a constant crop of this rare delicacy, which is dwindling rapidly by the year.
For decades, the destructive methods used by truffle hunters have continued to damage their natural habitat, leading to an incremental decline in their yields. A decade ago, the annual output of truffles from Yongsheng county was somewhere between 500 and 800 metric tons - or around 20 percent of the province's total output. After more than 10 years of destructive hunting and picking practices, the current output has dropped by as much as 80 to 90 percent of that figure.
"Seven or eight years ago, I could pick more than 30 kilograms of truffles around one pond, and the largest single truffle would weigh around 350 grams. Now it is more normal to find just a few hundred grams of truffles around one pond," says Duan. "Although truffle prices have increased, there's just not as much for us to harvest, since the damage we have caused is too severe."
Duan's concern about the dwindling numbers of black truffles in Yunnan is very real. While many local farmers want to address the situation, they lack the knowledge and means to do so.
However, things started to turn around in February. Professor Liu Peigui, a researcher at the Kunming Institute of Botany of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and president of the Wild Fungus Conservation and Development Association of Yunnan province, traveled to Yongsheng to host three training sessions for more than 300 people, including Duan Chaowen, about the science of sourcing truffles.
Initiated by Yum China, the training sessions were part of the fast food company's recent Yum China Pizza Hut Grow Local Initiative, which placed Yongsheng's truffles at the top of its list of priorities.
For Duan, the two-day training course was similar to the timely arrival of rain after a long drought. He not only learned about how to source truffles in a scientific and environmentally friendly manner, but also acquired a deeper understanding of how to better protect this precious treasure in his hometown.
The type of truffle that accounts for the highest percentage of total output in Yongsheng is Tuber indicum. Its maturity season usually ranges from mid-November to late February or later. However, due to a lack of understanding of the truffles' growth patterns, local farmers used to start harvesting them as early as July.
Immature truffles are typically small and poor in quality, and their sale tends to weaken their competitiveness and lower their prices in the international market. However, most important, using the wrong harvesting methods can "kill the goose that laid the golden egg," resulting in a chronic waste of resources and ever-dwindling numbers of truffles found growing in the wild. This can eventually lead to a sharp decline in yields and have an adverse effect on the income levels of local farmers.
To address this problem, Yum China partnered with the local government and invited agricultural experts to invest money and resources into providing local farmers with long-term and multifaceted guidance in the form of training sessions, both online and offline. These sessions were designed to help farmers to transform the way they harvest and source truffles.
The training session that took place in February was part of this initiative, and Duan Chaowen was the first beneficiary of the project. It has given him hope that he will be able to continue to drive the sustainable sourcing of truffles in his hometown.
Liu says: "It is very important to complete this scientific training and education. The production of truffles not only has enormous scientific and economic value, but also, and perhaps more important, ecological value.
Accompanying Liu at the course were a police officer and a search dog from the Kunming Police Dog Base. The course also included truffle-hunting training for dogs and on-the-ground demonstrations of how to source truffles. In the past, pigs were typically used to locate truffles. However, the use of dogs can actually be more efficient and scientifically viable. Dogs are less likely to damage the truffles, as they generally have a more stable temperament and a better ability to understand instructions more clearly.
In the meantime, Yum China has created a number of new products that include truffles and has helped local companies to improve their standards to meet Yum China's procurement requirements. The procurement of truffles from Yunnan not only delivers economic benefits to the local area, but also helps food outlets like Yum China create more innovative menus. Since April, more than 2,200 Pizza Hut restaurants nationwide have featured pizza products containing high-end truffles from Yunnan.
Joey Wat, CEO of Yum China, says, "By enhancing local farmers' expertise and knowledge, and connecting them with our national customer base, we hope the Grow Local Initiative will improve local economic and living conditions and support the sustainable expansion of the truffle industry in Yunnan."
President Xi Jinping has said poverty alleviation initiatives need to be implemented in different ways and should be designed to encourage society to play an active role in reducing poverty.
Alice Wang, chief public affairs officer at Yum China, says the success of corporate social responsibility projects lies in perseverance. "The power of companies is not infinite. Only by combining the core advantages of companies and the strength of industries and society can we successfully drive sustainable development."
, 06-29-2018
An initiative started by a leading fast food company has transformed the way farmers in Yunnan source, manage and harvest truffles, Zhang Lei reports
Sixty-year-old Duan Chaowen, a forest ranger and head of Duanjia village in a remote area of Yunnan province, spends his days patrolling the mountains near his home in Yongbei town, Yongsheng county. In one valley, which he knows so well that he can practically retrace it from memory, lies a rare kind of black truffle.
Like many local villagers, Duan is a veteran wild truffle hunter. Despite his best efforts over the past two decades in harvesting the valuable fungus, he has been unable to maintain a constant crop of this rare delicacy, which is dwindling rapidly by the year.
For decades, the destructive methods used by truffle hunters have continued to damage their natural habitat, leading to an incremental decline in their yields. A decade ago, the annual output of truffles from Yongsheng county was somewhere between 500 and 800 metric tons - or around 20 percent of the province's total output. After more than 10 years of destructive hunting and picking practices, the current output has dropped by as much as 80 to 90 percent of that figure.
"Seven or eight years ago, I could pick more than 30 kilograms of truffles around one pond, and the largest single truffle would weigh around 350 grams. Now it is more normal to find just a few hundred grams of truffles around one pond," says Duan. "Although truffle prices have increased, there's just not as much for us to harvest, since the damage we have caused is too severe."
Duan's concern about the dwindling numbers of black truffles in Yunnan is very real. While many local farmers want to address the situation, they lack the knowledge and means to do so.
However, things started to turn around in February. Professor Liu Peigui, a researcher at the Kunming Institute of Botany of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and president of the Wild Fungus Conservation and Development Association of Yunnan province, traveled to Yongsheng to host three training sessions for more than 300 people, including Duan Chaowen, about the science of sourcing truffles.
Initiated by Yum China, the training sessions were part of the fast food company's recent Yum China Pizza Hut Grow Local Initiative, which placed Yongsheng's truffles at the top of its list of priorities.
For Duan, the two-day training course was similar to the timely arrival of rain after a long drought. He not only learned about how to source truffles in a scientific and environmentally friendly manner, but also acquired a deeper understanding of how to better protect this precious treasure in his hometown.
The type of truffle that accounts for the highest percentage of total output in Yongsheng is Tuber indicum. Its maturity season usually ranges from mid-November to late February or later. However, due to a lack of understanding of the truffles' growth patterns, local farmers used to start harvesting them as early as July.
Immature truffles are typically small and poor in quality, and their sale tends to weaken their competitiveness and lower their prices in the international market. However, most important, using the wrong harvesting methods can "kill the goose that laid the golden egg," resulting in a chronic waste of resources and ever-dwindling numbers of truffles found growing in the wild. This can eventually lead to a sharp decline in yields and have an adverse effect on the income levels of local farmers.
To address this problem, Yum China partnered with the local government and invited agricultural experts to invest money and resources into providing local farmers with long-term and multifaceted guidance in the form of training sessions, both online and offline. These sessions were designed to help farmers to transform the way they harvest and source truffles.
The training session that took place in February was part of this initiative, and Duan Chaowen was the first beneficiary of the project. It has given him hope that he will be able to continue to drive the sustainable sourcing of truffles in his hometown.
Liu says: "It is very important to complete this scientific training and education. The production of truffles not only has enormous scientific and economic value, but also, and perhaps more important, ecological value.
Accompanying Liu at the course were a police officer and a search dog from the Kunming Police Dog Base. The course also included truffle-hunting training for dogs and on-the-ground demonstrations of how to source truffles. In the past, pigs were typically used to locate truffles. However, the use of dogs can actually be more efficient and scientifically viable. Dogs are less likely to damage the truffles, as they generally have a more stable temperament and a better ability to understand instructions more clearly.
In the meantime, Yum China has created a number of new products that include truffles and has helped local companies to improve their standards to meet Yum China's procurement requirements. The procurement of truffles from Yunnan not only delivers economic benefits to the local area, but also helps food outlets like Yum China create more innovative menus. Since April, more than 2,200 Pizza Hut restaurants nationwide have featured pizza products containing high-end truffles from Yunnan.
Joey Wat, CEO of Yum China, says, "By enhancing local farmers' expertise and knowledge, and connecting them with our national customer base, we hope the Grow Local Initiative will improve local economic and living conditions and support the sustainable expansion of the truffle industry in Yunnan."
President Xi Jinping has said poverty alleviation initiatives need to be implemented in different ways and should be designed to encourage society to play an active role in reducing poverty.
Alice Wang, chief public affairs officer at Yum China, says the success of corporate social responsibility projects lies in perseverance. "The power of companies is not infinite. Only by combining the core advantages of companies and the strength of industries and society can we successfully drive sustainable development."
