Apple Apple Sales Survey

The price of land acquisitions has fallen below 1 yuan/kg, and the circulation and downstream industries have become worse

As the purchase price of the national fruit market quickly fell into the freezing point, “Sister Hibiscus”, who helped her family sell Shaanxi apples on Weibo, instantly became positive energy. In the first week of December, a reporter from the China Business Daily surveyed in Shaanxi learned that Apple's land acquisition price has fallen below RMB 1 per catty, which is far below the planting cost.

From celery, hawthorn to apples, the “slow sales” spread has become a cold wave for growers in this winter. Some analysts said that centralized listing triggered a temporary “oversupply,” but our reporter’s investigations in several fruit-producing counties in Shaanxi and Gansu have found that various links in the industrial chain have been distorted to varying degrees, long ago The status quo buried foreshadowed.

Upstream: fruit industry economic policy "revitalization"

Wugong County in Xianyang City is already at minus 8 degrees Celsius, but Zhang Weimin still lives in simple tents to look after his own harvest apple.

He told reporters that the output of this year is about 50,000 kilograms, but most of the apples are still unsalable in the field. Even if Apple is sold, most of the prices do not exceed 2 yuan/kg.

Recent statistics released by the Shaanxi Provincial Department of Agriculture show that only Xianyang has sold 4 million tons of unmarketable apples this year.

“Some peasants are greatly disappointed with the gains from agricultural and sideline products. Some peasants have even choked off fruit trees that have already been fruited.” Qiu Hong, an agricultural and sideline product operator, told reporters. In recent years, economic agriculture has been highly favored by various local governments. For this reason, various local governments have introduced numerous preferential policies to guide farmers to move closer to economic agriculture. Some local governments have played the "agricultural economy to promote county economic development" brand and engaged in agricultural demonstration parks to influence the surrounding farmers to move closer to them.

In the process of forming economies of scale, "agricultural subsidies" have played an important role.

Qiu Hong has been engaged in agricultural and sideline products business for nearly 15 years. "Each year, the funds obtained from the government are close to 30% of the total investment," he said.

Agricultural subsidies also affect the choice of growers to some extent. Xianquan County, Liquan County, before 2000, mostly planted wheat and corn here, a villager surnamed Zhang told reporters that at that time the kind of apple even had to hand in the fruit industry tax. Later, with the implementation of the state's policy of supporting economic agriculture, the fruit industry tax was also abolished. He began to replant apples.

After 2000, support policies were increased, including the free training of production techniques for the fruit industry every year. For some fruit trees in mountainous areas, the “returning farmland to forest fees” is RMB 140 per mu. Now his 8 acres of contracted arable land are all planted with fruit trees, and more than 80% of the 7,000 acres of the village are all fruit trees.

The reporter learned that the specific subsidy funds for agricultural subsidies are allocated by the state's finances. Then, the local government statistics the planting areas of various crops and reports them level by level. Finally, the provincial-level relevant departments allocate the subsidy funds according to the reported data quotas. .

It is worth noting that if a large-scale production can be formed, the subsidy standard for single mu will increase significantly. Taking corn as an example, corn will be subsidized at 10 yuan per mu, but the corn produced in large-scale production will reach 80 yuan per mu. According to a person from the Shanxi Agriculture Department, the country now vigorously develops rural cooperatives to promote the development of a new type of agricultural economy. For agricultural cooperatives, the state can provide a one-time interest-free loan of 4 million yuan.

Under the favorable conditions, the cultivation of single-product agricultural products is expanding. Take Apple as an example. From 2006 to 2011, the apple planting area in Shaanxi Province alone exceeded 1.14 million hectares, an increase of 33% compared with the area planted in 2006; the output in 2011 was as high as 14.2 million tons, which accounted for the total apple production in China and around the world respectively. 1/3 and 1/8.

An analyst who has long paid attention to the agricultural economy told reporters that in addition to state subsidies, there are also places where interest-free loans, discount loans, technical guidance, fertilizer concessions and other measures have been accompanied.

The above-mentioned growers stated that in the early stages of planting apple trees, basically all investments were made, and fruiting began three years later, and subsidies and other measures were withdrawn at this stage. "At the best time, the income per mu is close to ten thousand yuan. But this year, the loss per kilogram of apples is close to one yuan." However, he said that because it has already devoted itself to planting apples, even if the harvest is not good, it is difficult to switch to other industries.

The reporter’s investigation was informed that due to the early start of the Xianyang fruit industry, the economic benefits of the fruit industry also led the surrounding “following”.

An original agricultural leader in Liquan County, Shaanxi Province, stated to reporters that in 2000, the status of the country’s fruit industry economy in the county economy was not yet very obvious, but the apple output in Xianyang had already begun to show benefits. The Qingyang City of Gansu Province is seeing the results achieved by the Xianyang Fruit Industry. By emulating and purchasing Xianyang saplings, the government has come forward to plan and develop the fruit industry economy. In 2011, CCTV’s “Focus on Interviews” column revealed that the government of Ning County in Gansu Province had forced the eradication of the replanting of fruit trees. At that time, agricultural experts questioned the local government’s “compulsory agricultural economy” that violated the laws of market development. In the same region, the plunge of Apple's price in 2012 seems to partially support the drawbacks of blindly expanding the planting area.

Midstream: circulation is difficult to reduce pressure

Right now, although the purchase price has dropped to about half of the previous year's price, but Apple dealers still seem reluctant to buy.

In the retail market in Beijing, the retail price of Fuji apple with better varieties is about RMB 6 per catty. If the purchase price is RMB 2 yuan, the price difference will be as high as RMB 4. However, such a spread of nearly 2 times in the eyes of dealers does not constitute profitability.

Yuan Xiang, an Apple distributor in Guangdong, described the reason for this. "Apple's additional cost is very high both in the production process of farmers and in the sales process of dealers. In the production process of farmers, many links such as fertilization, pruning of fruit trees, spraying of pesticides, bagging and fruit picking are needed. The hands of dealers also need to go through procedures such as picking, packing and transportation. If these costs are added, an apple from the production site to the end market will not be able to make any money if there is no more than twice the price difference. "Yuan Xiang believes that the high profits in the circulation sector have led to an unbalanced distribution of the industrial chain Liu Run.

Analysts from Beijing AIG Agriculture and other institutions said that this is mainly due to the significant increase in costs in circulation compared with previous years. In the third quarter of this year, domestic refined oil prices reached the commanding heights, which led the logistics industry to raise prices. However, after the NDRC lowered the refined oil prices in mid-November, the follow-up effect of the “additional reduction” price adjustment mechanism has been fermented, and the logistics industry has not reduced the transportation prices due to the drop in oil prices. At the time of the peak sales season of agricultural and sideline products, major logistics companies have not made excessive price adjustments for this purpose.

A person in charge of Guangzhou COSCO Logistics Company stated that the most important reason affecting the logistics industry is firstly the level of oil prices, followed by the price of labor. However, the increase in the tax rate brought about by the nation’s accelerating adjustment to the “reform from the camp” has become a new cost.

In areas that have already been piloted, the tax rate for the transportation industry has increased from the previous 3% to 11%, and the logistics service industry has also increased from the previous 5% to 6%. However, in practice, the greatest benefit of changing VAT is that the deduction of input tax is not perfect, and not all input tax can be tax deductible. This allows logistics companies to increase revenue by raising prices. Producers become the ultimate buyers. Perhaps this year's delay in improving the circulation of agricultural products is an early warning.

Downstream: shortage of industrial connectivity

“The slow sales of agricultural and sideline products have spread to all regions of the country, and the prices have declined relative to the previous years. However, the speed and magnitude of the decline in the sales of Apple are unprecedented.” The former officials in charge of agriculture cited the case of the county as an example.

According to the data obtained by the reporter in Shaanxi Province's fruit industry sector, in 2012, the number of fruit bags in Shaanxi Province increased by 12 trillion over the previous year. The output increased by 5% from the previous year, and the total output exceeded 9.5 million tons. In Hebei, Gansu, Henan, Liaoning, and Shandong, there have also been more than 5% growth.

At the same time, the growth rate of apple exports throughout the year did not coincide with the increase in apple production. The main reason for this is the tight relationship between China and Japan, and the fact that South Africa's apples have also achieved a bumper harvest this year. In the global economic downturn, they have taken some of China’s market, causing the country’s apple market to have a large number of unproductive places of origin.

Some analysts believe that the key to this flaw lies in the fact that the downstream market for Apple's products is too single. In addition to direct consumption and crushing of apple juice, few other products appear.

Qiu Hong told reporters that although it is also a mountain of agricultural products, although this year has also encountered an unprecedented "winter", but the loss is far less than Apple, which is due to the relatively wide range of uses of hawthorn, developed downstream products, in addition to eating In addition, it can be used medicinally, and there are nearly 100 kinds of downstream products. So when faced with market pressure, the price cuts will not be as big as Apple.

“We have also tried to introduce fruit juice production plants to the local area. However, manufacturers have asked if the price of apples is too high and what cannot be received. This type of problem is obviously not mandatory for the government,” said the former official responsible for agriculture.

He believes that this contradiction cannot be resolved locally in the short term.

This means that Zhang Weimin has no better way to counterbalance the volatility of the market for the time being.

An analyst from the China Fruit Circulation Association believes that when developing the agricultural economy, the government should respect the laws of the market, control the information concerning production areas and consumer markets, and guide people in a rational manner so as to truly benefit the people.