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'Veggie vids' cultivate a growing following for green-fingered friends

By Xu Lin | China Daily | Updated: 2019-05-04 07:05

Li Yue has joined three friends to cultivate a social media account devoted to sharing short videos that teach viewers how to grow their own produce online.

The account, "I love growing vegetables", has over a million followers on the news platform, Toutiao.

"I grew up in the countryside," says the 43-year-old from Shijiazhuang, Hebei province.

"I cherish the memories of my idyllic life (there). I'm glad to share experiences with other people and to popularize this pastime, especially in big cities."

Li says the process gives her a "sense of achievement".

"It gives me peace of mind and alleviates work stress. I feel at ease when I look at the vegetables."

The friends rented a 60-square-meter plot in rural Shijiazhuang in 2010. They've since expanded it to 800 sq m. The harvests are enough to feed them, and their relatives and close friends.

"People around my age share a feeling that produce like tomatoes aren't as delicious as the ones we ate in our childhoods. So, we thought, 'why not plant our own?'"

The group was also concerned about food safety and wanted to eat natural veggies.

Li had long thought about sharing their experiences online before she finally started to in 2016.

The foursome worked in different fields but became friends because of their shared love of gardening.

"The timing was right," Li says.

"China's mobile internet was booming in 2016. And it's convenient to shoot photos and videos with smartphones. And short videos have become very popular in recent years."

They started by posting photos and words. They opened an account on the popular short-video app, Douyin, in 2018.

China had 788 million mobile-internet users as of June 30, 2018, figures from the China Internet Network Information Center show.

Li says 43 percent of their Toutiao account's followers are ages 24 to 30; 20 percent are between 18 and 23; and another 20 percent are ages 31 to 40.

The group of friends makes the half-hour drive to their garden two or three times a week.

They also bring their children to give them a chance to get in touch with the outdoors.

"It takes a lot of time to record the whole process from planting to harvesting," Li says.

The growing time depends on the kind of produce and the weather. For example, leafy vegetables take between one and three months to ripen.

"Short videos are very direct. For instance, you can easily explain how to identify and pluck tomato plants' side branches to enhance yields," Li says.

The audience ranges from those hoping to cultivate veggies that are easy to grow to those who seek challenging varieties.

The group experimented with methods to improve crystalline ice plants' sprouting and yields, and then shared their results online when the vegetable became popular in China.

Popular produce includes sweet melons, watermelons, cucumbers, lettuce and tomatoes.

Their videos are unique in that they offer guidance on gardening as opposed to farming.

"I'm glad that what we're doing is meaningful. It fills a gap by showing ordinary people how to grow produce in their yards or in pots in their apartments," Li says.

Their videos feature foods grown both in gardens and in greenhouses, which are much like apartment balconies.

They teach people who grow veggies at home to use organic fertilizers such as chicken droppings and natural pesticides like plant ash.

They also run a chat group on WeChat for their "veggie friends".

"I make many friends there and am often touched by their stories," Li says.

Li says a user once sent a message saying his wife quit mahjong when she became interested in growing vegetables.

She also recalls that a mother started her family's garden to feed natural produce to her daughter, who was around age 6 and living with a chronic illness. The girl helped with the cultivation and finally recovered, Li says.

'Veggie vids' cultivate a growing following for green-fingered friends

(China Daily 05/04/2019 page6)

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