Maoming city, S China's Guangdong sets lychee prices according to fruit tree's age

More than 10 days remain before the harvest season for lychees, but fruit growers in Maoming city, south China's Guangdong Province have already put price tags on lychees according to the age of lychee trees.

File photo shows farmers harvesting lychees in Gaozhou, Maoming city, South China's Guangdong Province. (Photo/Nanfang Daily)

Baiqiao village in Genzi township, Maoming city is home to lychee trees of different ages, with the oldest ones being more than 1,000 years old. By pricing the fruits according to the age of fruit trees, local growers have received many orders before the harvest season.

A total of 19,400 lychee trees in Maoming are more than 100 years old and the city issues an ID card for each of them. By scanning the QR codes on the trees' ID cards, one can know about the age of the trees, and know who are taking care of them. The market favors fruits from old trees, which have a fresher and sweeter taste.

A man who runs a lychee orchard in Baiqiao village said that fruits from more than 3,700 trees planted in his orchard are sold out quickly every year.

Lychee cultivation dates back more than 2,000 years in Baiqiao village. In 2022, the local villagers' per capita income exceeded 50,000 yuan ($7,250) and the collective income of the village reached 1.7 million yuan.

He Jianhe, head of a lychee planting cooperative in Baiqiao village, said fruit growers used to be worried that their fruits couldn't sell well. But since the local government launched its marketing strategy, the fruits have since been in great demand every year. With the harvest season still more than 40 days away, 40 percent of his lychees have been ordered.

Maoming is the largest lychee producing region in the world and the planting areas for lychee are as large as 1.39 million mu (92,700 hectares) in the city. The annual output value of the local lychee industrial chain has exceeded 10 billion yuan.