Shouguang Carrots Industry Present Situation And Development Countermeasures

Carrot is one of the most common vegetables. And its nutrition plays an important role inour lives, known as on improving immunity, lowering blood pressure and having ananti-cancer effect. So accelerating the development of carrot industry can not only improvethe overall competitiveness of China’s carrot, but also promote the progress of medical andhealthcare cause.Hualong Twn, awarded the title “China’s Town of Carrot” by the Ministry of Agriculturein2000, is now the biggest carrot base with a relatively mature industrial chain of carrotplanting, storage, processing, and sales. The agricultural cooperatives have been developedrapidly in Hualong. Some problems also emerged at the same time.On the basis of an extensive research of Hualong carrot base, the author tried to analyzethe present situation and the problems existed in the whole carrot industry in Shouguang city.Some suggestions are also proposed in the paper, and the author wish those suggestions coulddo some help on the development of carrot industries in Shouguang and elsewhere.Problems exist now on several aspects. Firstly, standardization plantation areas are notenough, lack of unified standards for carrot fertilizing and spraying. Secondly, carrot industryin Shouguang is still labor-intensive and lack of mechanization. Thirdly, the agriculturalcooperatives are not running like those in mature market economies, such as the lack offarmers’ participation, at the same time market information was not well used, which result inthe frequent fluctuations of the production. Fourthly, deep processing with high added-valuehas not been given sound consideration. Regarding the current market need, areas for organiccarrot planting could have been enlarged. Fifthly, more focus could be put on marketinginnovation to expand market and to enhance the brand value of Shouguang’s carrot industry.To solve these problems, the following development countermeasures are proposed by theauthor. Standardization plantation areas could be expanded to lift the level of Shouguang’scarrot planting level. Shouguang government could play a bigger role on fund investment,land transfer process, network construction for information sharing, as well as the protectionof farmers’ rights. The need to develop deep-processing enterprises is urgent. Market could bemore diverse both at home and abroad. Last but not least, to guide and regulate the scientificdevelopment of local agricultural cooperatives is necessary for Shouguang’s carrot industry.