Countermeasures for Constructing Provincial Modern Agricultural Industrial Park: Taking Jellyfish Industry, the Leading Industry of Yingkou City as an Example

Qiuxiang HAN, Shengzhong DONG, Ting LIU, Xianghong LIU

1. Yingkou Agricultural and Rural Comprehensive Development Service Center, Yingkou 115000, China; 2. Shenyang Normal University, Shenyang 110034, China; 3. Jinzhou Inspection and Testing Certification Center, Jinzhou 121002, China

Abstract At present, modern agricultural industrial park with large-scale planting and breeding base as a platform has become an innovative measure to promote the development of regional modern agriculture and an important starting point for the implementation of rural industry revitalization, and it has been highly valued by local governments. Yingkou City has established and developed a modern agricultural industrial park with jellyfish as the leading industry. This will effectively fill the gap in this work in Yingkou City and boost the development of the jellyfish industry. This study provides strong support for the promotion of the city card of "China’s Hometown of Jellyfish".

Key words Modern agriculture, Industrial park, Jellyfish

1 Introduction

1.1 Definition of modern agricultural industrial parkModern agricultural industrial park is a modern agricultural development zone established with the approval of government departments, with clear geographical boundaries, reasonable regional scope and leading construction level. It focuses on local agricultural leading industry or advantageous characteristic industry and carries out the development of the entire industrial chain of "production+processing+science and technology+brand" based on large-scale planting and breeding base[1], in order to realize the deep integration of green development and primary, secondary and tertiary industries.

1.2 Requirements for the construction of modern agricultural industrial parksThe construction of a modern agricultural industrial park needs to be declared level by level. In order to be a national agricultural industrial park, it must be a provincial best first. Declaring a provincial industrial park should meet the following conditions: (i) The leading industries in the industrial park should be relatively concentrated, small in number but refined, with 1-3 leading industries highlighted. The breeding scale should be large and the development foundation should be good, with the scale reaching or exceeding 2 billion yuan. (ii) The industrial park should have various favorable factors such as local industrial advantages, development potential, economic location, environmental capacity and resource carrying capacity. (iii) The industrial park should be leading in various index areas. Modern elements should be highly concentrated. In principle, the income of farmers in provincial modern agricultural industrial parks is 25% higher than the local average, and that in national modern agricultural industrial parks is more than 30% higher than the local average. (iv) There must be a relatively complete construction and operation management system, and the infrastructure of the public service system such as water, electricity, road, telecommunications and network should be good.

1.3 Basic conditions for the construction of the jellyfish industrial park in Yingkou CityYingkou City has built a 206.64 km2jellyfish stocking area, accounting for 80% of the semi-finished raw materials required for the processing and export of jellyfish in China and earning up to 50 million USD. The deeply-processed aquatic products reach about 90 000 t per year, ranking first in Liaoning Province. Bayuquan District, Yingkou has a jellyfish trading center covering an area of 109 000 m2. At the same time, jellyfish products have won 2 provincial famous brands, 2 municipal famous brands (4 famous trademarks), and one EU registered import and export enterprise. In 2016, it became the China’s first national-level jellyfish export quality and safety demonstration zone. In 2018, it became the ecological origin-protected product of the AQSIQ and "China’s Hometown of Jellyfish". Especially in the past two years, the Bayuquan District Government has vigorously promoted the jellyfish industry. From production, processing, trade, circulation and other links, a complete industrial chain system has been created. The above measures have helped to promote the joint development of culture, tourism and other industries with jellyfish as the core. Through the "cross-border+diffusion+penetration+linkage" model, a new industry with large-scale, industrialized, modern and high-quality development of jellyfish brand has initially formed[2]. In short, Yingkou City has the basic conditions to create a provincial jellyfish industrial park. It is recommended that Yingkou can apply for provincial and even national modern agricultural industrial park projects with jellyfish as the leading industry.

2 The significance of constructing a jellyfish industrial park in Yingkou City

Combining with the development status of modern agricultural industrial parks in Liaoning Province, constructing a jellyfish industrial park is of great significance to the construction of the distribution center for jellyfish characteristic products in Yingkou City.

2.1 Filling in the gapsYingkou’s declaration of an industrial park dominated by jellyfish will fill the gap in this work. Yingkou City will be built into a coastal breeding and processing base in the "five regional development strategies" to set up a new demonstration for scientific and technological innovation of aquatic product brands and transformation of scientific and technological achievements.

2.2 Getting financial supportCurrently, Liaoning Province has established 20 provincial-level industrial parks. This year, it will continue to plan the construction of about 10 provincial-level industrial parks. If it can successfully create a national-level industrial park, it will receive 200 million yuan in support funds, including 100 million yuan from the national budget and 100 million yuan for the provincial budget. A full-time deputy director-level government post is set.

2.3 Increasing jobsAfter research, it is found that Yingkou City has currently 40 000-50 000 people engaged in the industry chain of acquisition, processing and distribution trade of jellyfish. The successful declaration of a provincial industrial park will get more policy dividends. Through the expansion of jobs, an employment rate of about 7%-15% is estimated to be increased to ensure that the linkage has a significant role in driving agriculture.

2.4 Increasing taxesDue to the limited output of fishing and breeding jellyfish in Yingkou City, some of the raw materials for processing are imported from abroad, accounting for about 45% of the raw materials. Rough processing accounts for about 75%. The total output value is about 860 million yuan. The construction of the jellyfish industrial park will effectively promote the deep processing industry and turn the advantage into a winning situation. There will be a significant increase in tax alone.

2.5 Enhancing the visibility of Yingkou jellyfishSuccessfully application for the jellyfish industrial park, with the help of policy funding, and creation of a new cluster of jellyfish product technology R&D center, product processing center, convention center and trade center to realize new carriers of industrialization[3]will bring new momentum to the development of the city card of "Yingkou Jellyfish".

3 Shortcomings in the construction of a modern industrial park in Yingkou City

Yingkou City had failed to apply for the establishment of a provincial industrial park in 2019. As a result, this work is still in a blank period. Therefore, how to solve the current dilemma, focusing on shortcomings in the development of the jellyfish industry will promote the application of Yingkou City[4]. The shortcomings of the construction of a modern industrial park in Yingkou City mainly include the following: (i) Insufficient investment in promoting the regional characteristics of the jellyfish industry in Yingkou City. There is no brand promotion advantage in the whole province and the whole country, and no industrial cluster advantage has been formed. (ii) The marketing and promotion of jellyfish products is single, and the value-added construction of product deep processing needs to be strengthened. (iii) The rough processing of jellyfish is basically dominated by retail households and family workshop-style production, resulting in uneven product quality, low efficiency and excessive production costs. (iv) Jellyfish deep processing companies lack industry organization, industry norms,etc., and a clustering effect has not been formed in the park, leading to waste of resources and increase of production costs. (v) The production standards are not uniform. There is unhealthy product homogeneity competition in the industry, and the market order is chaotic, affecting the economic benefits of jellyfish.

4 Successful experience and reference methods in Liaoning Province

4.1 Successful experienceBy understanding the construction status of modern agricultural industrial parks in Liaoning Province, some experience will be given to the application work of jellyfish industrial park in Yingkou City. (i) In 2018, "Panjin Rice" was assessed as a national industrial park. It pioneered the "Internet+adoption of agriculture" model, and successfully promoted the "Panjin Rice" and "Panjin River Crab" series of agricultural products. Panjin rice has been successfully built into the top position of the regional agricultural brands in Liaoning Province. (ii) In 2019, Donggang City was approved to enter the national-level industrial park creation list by taking advantage of the brand construction of "China’s Strawberry County". The current market value of the "Donggang Strawberry" brand has reached 7.75 billion yuan. (iii) In 2019, Donggang City was successfully approved again to be the provincial modern agricultural industrial park, taking shellfish as the leading industry. This measure has made an annual export profit of 180 million USD for Donggang City, effectively promoting the rapid development of the local aquaculture.

4.2 Reference methods(i) Learning from the brand promotion and successful marketing and promotion experience of "Panjin Rice" to create breeding-processing-distribution-export-technological service integrated production system and complete market industry chain for jellyfish in Yingkou City. (ii) Learning from intellectual support and the think tank support of Donggang City to create an industrial park and inviting experts from the Institute of Agricultural Economics and Development and the Agricultural Engineering Construction Service Center of Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences to guide the compilation of the industrial park creation plan and planning and review and check the implementation plan one by one in accordance with the provincial and national review requirements. (iii) Working hard to expand ideas and developing characteristic industrial economy continuously on the basis of learning from Donggong City’s successful application for a national modern agricultural industrial park, so as to provide a reference and demonstration for the construction of industrial parks declared for jellyfish, rice and facility fruits in Yingkou City.

5 Recommendations and measures

After extensively listening to expert suggestions and in-depth communication with relevant functional departments of Yingkou City, targeting at the shortcomings of Yingkou City, on the basis of learning from typical experience, specific measures and suggestions are proposed as follows.

5.1 Seizing the opportunity to carry out the application for the jellyfish industrial parkAccording to the feedback from the Department of Agriculture of Liaoning Province, the province plans to create 10 provincial-level agricultural industrial parks this year. Yingkou City should seize the opportunity to carry out the application work, check the creation and implementation plan item by item in accordance with the provincial and national review requirements, and improve the application success rate.

5.2 Overall planning to ensure that the industry becomes bigger and strongerThe location of the jellyfish industrial park should be centered on Bayuquan. The core area of jellyfish production and processing should be delimited. In the core area, high-standard production and processing should be implemented to comprehensively improve the quality of jellyfish. By learning from the experience of "Panjin Rice" and "Donggang Strawberry", through the bond of industrial parks, a breeding-processing-distribution-export-technological services integrated production system and complete market industry chain will be built for jellyfish in Yingkou. At the same time, preferential policies should be introduced. In terms of technology demonstration, standardized production, brand building,etc., encouraging policies can be formulated to broaden the financing channels and ensure that the funds for benefiting farmers are utilized rationally, thereby supporting the jellyfish industry to grow bigger and stronger.

5.3 Increasing investment to effectively expand product advantagesAt present, although the jellyfish industry in Yingkou City has improved in terms of production capacity, processing, logistics system, and publicity methods, it is in urgent need of investment in product promotion, e-commerce sales process, park infrastructure, and processing standard formulation. Through the construction of the jellyfish industrial park, the coordinated development of supporting industries will be promoted, the production of the jellyfish industry chain will be improved to continue to consolidate domestic and international market share by seizing opportunities.

5.4 Industry linkage to lead regional economic demonstrationThe relevant policies of Yingkou City should be formulated and improved to encourage existing leading jellyfish enterprises to demonstrate their leading role. The effective ways for leading enterprises to lead the development of the industry should be actively explored. The model of "company+base+retail" can be promoted to conclude a variety of interest linkage mechanisms. Through the construction of industrial parks, leading enterprises are supported to carry out order-based production, take the development path of small processing and large base, and accelerate the construction of production bases and the park.

5.5 Agglomeration to build a jellyfish industrial baseFull play should be given to the main body efficiency of the enterprises and the market and the brand strategy should be implemented to increase the international influence of jellyfish with the innovative model of "brand+project+industry+enterprise+market", relying on the "Yingkou Jellyfish" industrial base. Through the industrial park platform, on the basis of the existing enterprise clusters, multiple measures should be taken simultaneously to cultivate famous jellyfish production, processing, trade and circulation enterprises, and promote the business card of "Jellyfish City", making Yingkou a veritable distribution center for the jellyfish industry in China and even the world.

5.6 Formulating standards and increasing scientific research and developmentLed by Yingkou Jellyfish Industry Association, enterprises are organized to actively participate in the formulation of various standards. Regarding the amount of salt and alum used in the processing of jellyfish, processing technology and process specifications, industry standards are formulated to strengthen Yingkou jellyfish’s right to speak in the national industry and seize the strategic high ground. At the same time, supporting policies should be promulgated to encourage enterprises, universities, scientific research institutes and other units to carry out scientific and technological research and development cooperation to continuously extend the jellyfish industry chain and enhance the core competitiveness of the jellyfish industry.

5.7 Innovating promotion and promoting the integrated development of industriesCapital investment should be increased. Brand promotion activities should be carried out actively. The combination of publicity models is explored. Through TV media, self-media and webcast, combined with the cooperation with Laobian Internet celebrated town, efforts will be made both online and offline to expand brand influence and enhance public confidence in Yingkou jellyfish products. At the same time, well-known national e-commerce platforms such as Jingdong Mall and Tmall Supermarket will be utilized to drive the integrated development of the jellyfish industry in Yingkou and improve the economic benefits of products.

5.8 Combining culture and tourism to enhance the comprehensive benefits of jellyfishIn addition to the promotion of the jellyfish brand, the media of Yingkou City can be actively organized to dig deep into the long-standing culture and beautiful legends of jellyfish and other products, and tell the story of Yingkou. The jellyfish industry will be organically integrated with tourism, national customs, and leisure and vacation to cultivate new kinetic energy in the jellyfish industry and strengthen new business entities, thereby promoting the vigorous development of Yingkou’s characteristic agriculture-tourism integrated industry.