'Livestreaming Festival' boosts Zigui County's orange e-commerce
2023-04-21 20:04:37
By Chen Zai, Yichang International Communication Studio
Since 2019, Zigui has been encouraging its farmers and enterprises to keep up with the new trend of livestreaming. The livestreaming economy has since raised more than 100 million yuan of private investment and more than 23 million yuan of government subsidies. By building e-commerce training bases and MCN (Multi-Channel Network) livestreaming talent incubators, Zigui has trained more than 58,000 e-commerce professionals.
Zigui County recently held a “livestreaming festival” to boost the e-commerce sales of their famous oranges.
On April 19, the month-long 2023 Zigui Lunwan Orange Livestreaming Festival kicked off at the On-dam Orange Castle Theme Park in Shuitianba Township, Zigui County.
"The oranges that will be delivered to you are being picked right now in this orchard. They will be sent out today and reach you tomorrow or the day after," said a livestreaming host toward a smartphone. He picked out an orange from the tree and cut it open in front of the camera, showing the delicate and juicy pulp to his online viewers.
As the livestreaming continued, new orders were placed nearly every second as comments burst onto the screen: "These oranges look so tempting! It makes me hungry." "The place is so beautiful! I want to pick oranges there too." "Ordered yesterday and received today. The skin is thin and pulp juicy, very sweet."
During the festival, 35 livestreaming hosts and influencers would act as “Farmer Assists” and host more than 1,000 livestreaming sessions to promote Zigui’s navel oranges.
Zigui is known as the "Hometown of Oranges in China,” with 200,000 local people planting oranges on an area of 400,000 mu (26,667 hectares), producing nearly 1 million tons of oranges every year.
Since 2019, Zigui has been encouraging its farmers and enterprises to keep up with the new trend of livestreaming. The livestreaming economy has since raised more than 100 million yuan of private investment and more than 23 million yuan of government subsidies. By building e-commerce training bases and MCN (Multi-Channel Network) livestreaming talent incubators, Zigui has trained more than 58,000 e-commerce professionals.
Now, Zigui boasts more than 2,600 e-commerce enterprises with more than 8,100 online stores, creating more than 60,000 e-commerce related jobs.
A local farmer who had benefited from e-commerce said: "In the past, orange prices were dictated by the distributors alone. But now, it is up to the farmers and the market thanks to online sales."
With the annual e-commerce sales of oranges exceeding 3 billion yuan, the orange industry has become a key part of Zigui’s economy.
