Why Yan’an Apples Were Chosen for Space?

"Yan’an apples have a great taste, rich nutritional content, and good storability. Compared with fruits like oranges, they contain less juice, making them convenient for astronauts to eat in a weightless environment." On August 10, recalling the third time Yan’an apples were sent into space, Zhang Xia, logistics supervisor of the Supply Chain Department at Yan’an Huasheng Agricultural Technology Service Co., Ltd., still could not hide her excitement. During the launch missions of the Shenzhou-12, Shenzhou-13, and Shenzhou-14 manned spacecraft, Huasheng, as the contractor for fresh apple supply, sent Yan’an apples into space, breaking the historical norm that astronauts could only eat freeze-dried fruits in space. How has Yan’an achieved high-quality development of its apple industry? What are the core constraints holding back the industry? Having worked in the apple industry for 12 years, Zhang Xia has risen from an ordinary employee to head of the supply chain department, and has long pondered these questions. "The apple industry has faced bottlenecks due to small per-household orchard areas, difficulty accessing professional services, a lack of standardized management, low brand recognition, weak market risk resilience, and volatile prices that have eroded farmers’ confidence in investment," Zhang Xia said. Drawing on her understanding of agricultural industrial development, Zhang Xia strongly advocated that Huasheng Agricultural Technology should build demonstration farms for procurement at the front end, sign targeted purchase and sales agreements, provide full technical support and services in the middle stage, and adopt graded harvesting and pricing at the end to boost sales premiums. Meanwhile, riding the wave of the Internet, the company innovatively built an O2O e+ online service platform to empower efficient production, serving more than 100,000 member fruit farmers annually. Under the model of "service support and technology leadership", it has helped fruit farmers increase their output and income by more than 1 billion yuan, forming a unique five-in-one development model: seedling services to fields, technical services to orchards, agricultural materials to households, apple harvesting to sites, and financial services to homes. In May 2020, the Digital Agriculture and Rural Development Plan (2019–2025) issued by the Yan’an Municipal Bureau of Agriculture and Rural Affairs stated that by 2025, digital technology would be further integrated with the agricultural industrial system, production system, and operation system; digital transformation of agricultural production and operation would achieve remarkable progress; digital governance and services would be significantly improved; and the share of agricultural digital economy would rise substantially. At present, seizing the opportunity of using "digital agriculture" to boost rural revitalization, Yan’an Huasheng Agricultural Technology Service Co., Ltd. adheres to the philosophy of growing, selecting, and selling high-quality apples. Relying on a team of more than 1,200 service station directors across six counties and one district in Yan’an, and focusing on the development of demonstration procurement farms and the Huasheng e+ platform, the company has continuously strengthened its full industrial chain capacity. "Our agricultural service network now covers six counties and one district in Yan’an, with 3 million mu of orchard bases and over 1,000 on-network employees. Through 944 service stations located in major towns and villages of core high-quality apple-growing areas, we provide full industrial chain integrated services for 210,000 member fruit farmers. By integrating agricultural technical services, agricultural material supply, apple harvesting, rural logistics, rural finance, and daily living services, we have built a multi-functional comprehensive agricultural service platform, demonstrating best practices for farmers, working alongside them, and helping them earn more," Zhang Xia said. The company promotes orchard technical solutions through training lectures, on-site guidance, and online technical service platforms, solving technical problems for fruit farmers, guiding scientific and efficient planting, and increasing farmers’ income. Organizing renowned fruit tree experts, it formulates scientific fertilization and pesticide formulas tailored to local orchards, based on apple tree nutritional needs, soil conditions, and pest and disease patterns, and delivers them directly to farmers. It implements unified quality standards, unified purchasing methods, and unified purchasing prices, conducting batch, graded, and priced harvesting to encourage farmers to improve fruit quality and raise their earnings. It provides Huasheng benefit-oriented loans, innovating financial services to support safe production by farmers and upgrade the industrial chain. ... "The Huasheng e+ platform is being developed in three phases. Currently, I am mainly responsible for upstream product selection and procurement for the platform, as well as warehousing, sorting, allocation, and logistics distribution at the central warehouse," Zhang Xia told reporters. Phase I, featuring mall functions and a community platform, has been operating stably. Phase II focuses on developing an apple quality traceability big data system, apple settlement system, and AI farm doctor, which is currently under construction. Phase III will prioritize building a service module for an apple industry standard system. As of June 2022, the platform had served more than 80,000 member fruit farmers, enabled full traceability for over 20,000 mu of demonstration procurement farms, provided direct and indirect agricultural benefit subsidies of more than 20 million yuan, and boosted farmers’ income by over 1 billion yuan. Through modules including information systems, apple quality traceability big data systems, apple industry standard systems, apple trading settlement systems, AI farm doctors, and a public community, it has made planting more efficient and life better. "With more than 1,200 service station directors across Yan’an, we hope to expand service coverage and improve service efficiency and connotation through the Huasheng e+ platform. We aim to build a regional comprehensive agricultural service platform dedicated to the apple industry, integrating technical services, information services, logistics services, financial services, harvesting services, and social services. We will create a win-win ecosystem in core high-quality apple-growing areas where production and living services are easily accessible to member fruit farmers, empowered by digital technology to boost rural revitalization and advance Yan’an’s 'digital agriculture' development," said Yi Junchao, Deputy General Manager of Yan’an Huasheng Agricultural Technology Service Co., Ltd. (Reporter: Chen Hongjiang)