While attending the 11th session of the Henan people's congress in the provincial capital, farmer Li Feng got a call from his wife telling him she was busy cleaning a snow-covered plastic sheet on their farm. What lay under the sheet was Li's pride and joy, his strawberries. His wife was concerned the fruit would be damaged by the heavy snowfall.

"I told her not to worry, and to just brush the snow off", Li said. Li was elected a deputy to the congress to represent farmers. He was bestowed the honor for his outstanding work in introducing new kinds of fruit and vegetables to his village in Henan. The province has 70 million farmers. "In northern China, eating fresh fruit in winter was impossible in the past," Li said.

"Now through advanced logistics and transportation we can have fresh fruit all year round. But I'm focusing on fresh local fruit." From 1988 to 1995, Li was a migrant worker in Henan and Beijing, but he had always held a keen interest in agronomy.
"I once overheard a conversation between two Zhejiang people on a train that planting strawberries was a very profitable business", Li said. "So I decided to give it a go."

In 2000, Li bought 100 strawberry plants for 350 yuan ($48) from the Zhejiang provincial agricultural science institute. From 2002, he began achieving high yields of the fruit and sales took off. Strawberries are now grown on 267 hectares and farmers sell their produce to Beijing, Harbin and Hong Kong. The strawberries sell for 10 yuan per 500 g, with a single hectare able to generate between 18,000 yuan and 225,000 yuan a season. When the season ends, watermelon is planted on the same land.
"Being a farmer, I love growing fruit all year round," Li said.