Longhui honeysuckle
Longhui Honeysuckle
Dear friends:
Hello everyone! Welcome to Longhui, the "Hometown of Modern Chinese Folk Painting" and the "Hometown of Chinese Honeysuckle," for sightseeing and tourism.
Longhui is located in the south-central part of Hunan, slightly to the southwest, with a total area of 2,866 square kilometers. It is home to 13 ethnic groups including Han, Hui, Yao, Miao, and Dong, with a total population of 1.1 million. It is the birthplace of Wei Yuan, the first person in modern Chinese history to "open his eyes to see the world," a famous thinker, historian, and man of letters of the Qing Dynasty who advocated "learning advanced techniques from the foreigners in order to resist them." Longhui means "the dragon returns." Legend has it that in ancient times a great dragon, together with eight small dragons, set off from the foot of Jiulong Mountain within the territory, soaring toward the East Sea. Midway, it looked back and saw its former dwelling place wrapped in steaming clouds and glowing mists, with spiritual essence concentrated there, and was suddenly overcome with longing for its old home. So it turned back and settled at Jiulong. From then on, it nourished all things and gave rise to all living beings. This poetic myth and beautiful legend add infinite scenery and charm to Longhui.
Here there are more than 80 kinds of mineral resources including gold, manganese, silica, and rare earth. After on-site investigation by the Chinese Academy of Sciences, it was confirmed to be a rare selenium-rich area in the world. Its selenium content is 25 times the world average and 30 times the national average. It is another selenium-rich area after Enshi and Ziyang, and is one of China's three major selenium capitals. Selenium-rich agricultural products have been effectively developed. Yipeng and Yinxian brand honeysuckle tea, Baoqing brand dragon-tooth lily, Taohua brand chili sauce, Haozhiyuan brand pumpkin powder, and Fengdu brand Cuiluo tea have all obtained national green food certification. Honeysuckle, as a traditional advantageous selenium-rich agricultural product here, has been officially included in the National Pharmacopoeia. Its output accounts for more than 60% of the national total, and it has been named "Hometown of Chinese Honeysuckle" by the State Forestry Administration.
You must all clearly remember the SARS outbreak in 2003—that was an unforgettable dark period! So, regarding the prevention and treatment of this plague, which spread so widely and harmed people so deeply that it turned faces pale at the mere mention of it, do you know what the first-choice traditional Chinese medicine recommended by most experts for preventing SARS was? It is honeysuckle, which we are talking about today.
Since the first SARS patient was discovered in Heyuan, Guangdong, in November 2002, experts everywhere have been painstakingly researching drugs to prevent and treat SARS, but the results had remained poor. Because of the widespread use of Western antibiotics over many years, people's immune function had declined. For this reason, traditional Chinese medicine experts across the country successively prescribed anti-infection and antiviral Chinese medicine formulas led by honeysuckle, and the preventive and therapeutic effects were very obvious. In Guangzhou, after research, experts determined an effective and important folk prescription for preventing SARS, mainly composed of honeysuckle, forsythia, isatis root, schizonepeta, and other Chinese medicines. In Beijing, the State Administration of Traditional Chinese Medicine and the China Association of Chinese Medicine also organized some famous traditional Chinese medicine experts in the capital in April 2003 to discuss the SARS condition from the perspective of traditional Chinese medicine. The Chinese medicine formula recommended to the public was honeysuckle, raw astragalus, bupleurum, scutellaria, and so on. The formula prescribed by Beijing Tongrentang was composed, in order, of honeysuckle, forsythia, scutellaria, bupleurum, and so on.
The reason experts chose honeysuckle first is that its value in traditional Chinese medicine is extraordinary. This Chinese herbal medicine, which has a long history of cultivation in China, is favored by people for its unique health-preserving effects and great safety. Honeysuckle is also known as silver flower, Japanese honeysuckle, double flower, and second flower. It is a plant of the genus Lonicera in the family Caprifoliaceae. It grows in sheltered, sunny places and does not wither in deep winter, hence the name "winter-enduring." It is a perennial woody vine, and its flower buds are used as medicine. The buds grow in pairs from the leaf axils. They are white when first opening and turn golden yellow when fully open, with a rich fragrance, hence the name honeysuckle. The flowering period is from June to July, and the flowers grow in pairs, so it is also called "double flower" and "second flower." Honeysuckle is cold in nature and sweet in taste. Its main components include chlorogenic acid, isochlorogenic acid, linalool, benzaldehyde, ylangene, and brown-haired wintergreen saponins. The flowers, leaves, and vines of honeysuckle can all be used as medicine, and they contain more than 30 elements essential to the human body. It has the effects of clearing heat, detoxifying, cooling blood, and promoting meridians and collateral circulation. It inhibits staphylococcus, hemolytic streptococcus, dysentery bacillus, and various skin fungi, and is a major medicine for treating pneumonia, throat diseases, influenza, acute and chronic gastroenteritis, and vasculitis.
Honeysuckle is a precious Chinese medicinal material, and traditional Chinese medicine highly praises its medicinal and health-care effects. The Shennong Bencao Jing lists it as a top-grade medicine; the Mingyi Bielu says it can treat all rheumatic diseases; the Dictionary of Traditional Chinese Medicine says it is non-toxic, treats warm-disease fever, enters the lung and heart meridians, and clears heat, detoxifies, and unblocks collaterals. The Imperial Fragrance Record notes that Empress Dowager Cixi used honeysuckle liquid to moisturize her skin and restore youthful appearance. Traditional Chinese medicine research has long confirmed that honeysuckle has the effect of clearing heat and detoxifying. In the ancient formula Yinqiao San, honeysuckle is the main medicine, and Yinqiao Pill, an improved form of Yinqiao San, is a famous Chinese patent medicine for treating colds, pharyngitis, and certain skin diseases. It can reduce fever, clear internal heat, reduce inflammation, and relieve pain, yet it does not cause gastrointestinal side effects. In addition, the most effective instant drink ingredient in cooling beverages is honeysuckle. Using honeysuckle as tea and brewing it with boiling water can help prevent summer diseases such as heatstroke and intestinal infectious diseases. For summerheat irritability and children's sores and boils, one can take 10 grams of honeysuckle and steep it in boiling water as tea, which has a certain therapeutic effect.
Modern medical research shows that honeysuckle is rich in chlorogenic acid and isochlorogenic acid, and its medicinal value is reflected in three aspects: first, resisting pathogenic microorganisms. Experiments have shown that honeysuckle has varying degrees of inhibitory effect on various pathogenic bacteria and viruses. Second, enhancing immune function. Honeysuckle can promote lymphocyte transformation and enhance the phagocytic function of white blood cells. Third, anti-inflammatory and antipyretic effects. Honeysuckle can promote the release of adrenal cortical hormones and has a clear inhibitory effect on inflammation. In more than 100 Chinese patent medicines, honeysuckle is an important ingredient, yet there was not a single deeply processed honeysuckle product. With the development of applications for honeysuckle, its field has begun to expand from single medicinal use to health foods, beverages, and daily chemicals. In medicinal use, products in various forms such as tablets, injections, and oral liquids have been developed; in the spice industry, honeysuckle perfume, honeysuckle bath liquid, honeysuckle toothpaste, and others have been developed; in food and beverages, more than 100 products have been developed, including honeysuckle tea, honeysuckle juice, and beer. Honeysuckle brewed as tea has a fragrant aroma and refreshes the heart and lungs when drunk, and it can also prevent heatstroke and lower body temperature. It is an excellent ingredient for preparing cooling beverages, suitable for all ages, and is the "darling" of the health products market. Honeysuckle also has a skin-care effect. Frequently bathing with water infused with honeysuckle makes the skin smoother, more delicate, and healthier. For newborns, using it for bathing is even more excellent; it can not only prevent mosquitoes and treat heat rash, but also disinfect, sterilize, and relieve itching. Therefore, honeysuckle has enormous market potential.
Honeysuckle has a recorded history in China of more than 2,200 years. Since Longhui began cultivating it in the 1970s, more than 30 years have passed, and its cultivation techniques as well as the technological innovations and research results in honeysuckle development have all reached the leading domestic level. The planting area has grown to 300,000 mu, with an output of more than 10,000 tons. Products sell well in major and medium-sized cities such as Guilin, Guangzhou, Chongqing, and Nanjing, as well as in major pharmaceutical factories across the country. Because Longhui's honeysuckle planting scale ranks first in the country, and the honeysuckle produced is golden in color and high in sugar content, its output occupies "half of the country," and it has long been a hot seller in the market. This has established the position of Longhui County's honeysuckle in the national Chinese medicinal materials market and effectively enhanced the market competitiveness of Longhui honeysuckle.
Honeysuckle prefers a warm, humid climate with abundant sunshine. It has strong adaptability and is resistant to cold, drought, and waterlogging. It can be cultivated in plains and mountainous areas, and it is not strict about soil requirements. However, honeysuckle yields are higher when cultivated in high-altitude areas, because in high-altitude areas the honeysuckle plant grows more slowly, the vine segments are shorter, and there are more flowers. The main production area of Longhui honeysuckle is in Xiaoshajiang, Dashuitian, and other places at the northern foot of Xuefeng Mountain, with an average altitude of more than 1,300 meters. Because of the superior geographical conditions here, the mountain tops are shrouded in clouds and mist year-round, rainfall is moderate, sunshine is abundant, the soil is sandy loam, loose and fertile, with deep soil layers, and the air is fresh. Clear springs flow all year round in the mountains, and there is no pollution within a 60-kilometer radius. The organic selenium content is as high as 0.212–0.818 ppm, making it a high-selenium area. It has been listed as a national-level agricultural standardization demonstration zone and has superior ecological environment conditions for cultivating honeysuckle, and its product quality has been praised by many experts and professors. Modern research believes that the main component through which honeysuckle exerts its health-care effects is chlorogenic acid, called "plant platinum" on the international market, priced at 60,000 yuan per kilogram, and possessing enormous development value. The honeysuckle produced here is of excellent quality. According to tests by Hunan University of Chinese Medicine, the Hunan Academy of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Wuling University, and other institutions, its effective elements are all higher than similar products from other places. The content of chlorogenic acid and isochlorogenic acid is as high as 7%, far above the 1.5% standard in the National Pharmacopoeia. The content of other effective ingredients and trace elements is also [text incomplete]. The per capita annual net income of farmers in the project area can increase by 600 yuan.
This demonstration zone is one of China's three major honeysuckle bases. It is a historically renowned medicinal materials production base with abundant Chinese medicinal material resources. It is one of the country's six major Chinese medicinal materials production bases, with more than 200 kinds of precious medicinal materials, among which honeysuckle output accounts for 60% of the country's total. Its main varieties include honeysuckle, atractylodes, eucommia, gastrodia, salvia, and other herbal medicines, and it enjoys the reputation of "Southern Land of Medicine" and "Hometown of Chinese Honeysuckle." In the Xiaoshajiang area, 95% of farming households in one town and two townships grow honeysuckle. In recent years, most growers have escaped poverty by growing medicinal materials. At present, four varieties of Longhui honeysuckle—Lonicera japonica, Lonicera hypoglauca, Lonicera macranthoides, and mountain honeysuckle—have all been included in the National Pharmacopoeia. Among them, Lonicera macranthoides in particular has many excellent characteristics, and the chlorogenic acid content in its flower buds is the highest among all honeysuckles in the country.
At present, one-third of traditional Chinese medicine prescriptions nationwide use honeysuckle. It is a major bulk medicinal material in traditional Chinese medicine and an important raw material for medicine. Overseas demand is also very large. The pharmacopoeias of Japan, South Korea, Europe, and others also include honeysuckle as medicine, and supply falls short of demand. Honeysuckle is exported to more than 10 countries including South Korea, Singapore, Japan, Canada, and Australia, with an annual export volume of 500 tons.
At present, the annual global trade volume of Chinese herbal medicine is nearly 30 billion US dollars, while China accounts for only 3% of it. As the birthplace of Chinese herbal medicine, China nevertheless has to export many medicinal materials through third countries. Thus, while veteran Chinese doctors are still using their ancestral secret prescriptions to write prescriptions and dispense medicines for patients, Japan and South Korea have already earned large amounts of US dollars with Chinese herbal medicine. "Protection of geographical indications of origin" is hailed as the "golden key to participating in international competition." Once a product is listed as a product protected by origin, its value will rise exponentially, and its market share will also expand exponentially. So far, four products, including Liuyang fireworks, Longhui dragon-tooth lily, and Longhui honeysuckle, have obtained protection rights.
In the past, the per capita income of more than 50,000 farmers living here was less than 200 yuan. Back then, when Chen Bangzhu, then governor of Hunan Province, inspected work in Huxingshan Yao Township and saw local farmers eating glutinous rice grass, he shed tears in the Yao mountains. At the end of the 20th century, since fully implementing the strategy of combining comprehensive agricultural development with industrial structure adjustment and the promotion of science and technology, funds for comprehensive agricultural development projects, poverty alleviation funds, and work-relief funds have been bundled together to actively guide and support local farmers in vigorously developing the cultivation of honeysuckle and other Chinese medicinal materials. According to the climate characteristics of this area—high mountains, much fog, low temperatures, and abundant rain—in the process of returning farmland to forest, returning farmland to forest was combined with the development of distinctive forestry to achieve income growth through forestry. By adopting afforestation models such as "forest-fruit, forest-oil, and forest-medicine," the follow-up industries in areas returning farmland to forest have been effectively cultivated, the long-term livelihood problems of farmers returning farmland have been solved, and the achievements of returning farmland to forest have been consolidated and developed. Through arduous exploration, private capital was introduced, and the Chinese medicinal materials industry based mainly on honeysuckle was vigorously developed, opening a new path for poverty alleviation through the development of efficient green agricultural products. While guiding farmers to trial-plant honeysuckle in front of and behind their houses and along roadsides and field ridges, professors and experts from Hunan Agricultural University and other research institutions were hired as technical consultants. Excellent varieties such as dense-node honeysuckle were introduced from Shandong, and specially assigned personnel were drawn from agricultural technical departments to form technical service teams to guide the cultivation and management of honeysuckle. An advantageous industrial belt with large scale, distinctive features, and high efficiency was formed. Products such as honeysuckle, dragon-tooth lily, tiger-claw ginger, Baoqing chili, and red-skin garlic sell well domestically and are famous overseas. More than 200,000 mu of honeysuckle are now planted, making this area one of the country's three major honeysuckle production areas, and it is known as the "Hometown of Chinese Honeysuckle." Per capita income has reached 2,200 yuan, bringing earth-shaking changes to the people's living standards here and giving wings to economic development.
Every July is the season when honeysuckle blooms in full. If you come to the Xiaoshajiang area at this time, it is truly beautiful. Every mountain and ridge is covered with white and golden honeysuckle; the mountain fields are a sea of flowers; and the front and back of farmhouses in mountain villages are also full of honeysuckle. Under some clusters of honeysuckle are pumpkin vines climbing all over, looking especially charming. The shy, half-hidden, budding honeysuckle, and the fully blooming honeysuckle with spreading stamens, in clusters, strings, and patches, dress the mountain villages and wild ridges for dozens of kilometers around Xiaoshajiang Town as beautifully as a painting. It is not at all an exaggeration to say this is a world of flowers, a sea of flowers. To be able to live in this fragrant world is truly one of the great blessings of life. The tiny honeysuckle not only adorns the beautiful mountain scenery, but also lights the hope of mountain people to become rich.
Xiaoshajiang is located at the eastern foot of Xuefeng Mountain, with an average altitude of 1,350 meters, and has long been known as "Little Tibet." Even in midsummer, one feels a coolness all over. It is precisely this high-cold climate that is very suitable for the growth of honeysuckle. Since ancient times, the Xiaoshajiang area has produced honeysuckle. However, it was mainly wild at first, scattered on mountain slopes and wild ridges, and local people rarely sold or processed it. In the late 1980s, breakthroughs in artificial cultivation techniques for honeysuckle made people realize that the idle flowers and wild grasses they had once scorned could bring tremendous changes to their lives. Especially after the emergence of SARS, people became even more fully aware of the value of honeysuckle, and an upsurge of every household planting honeysuckle appeared. This fundamentally changed the production and lifestyle of the people here and also brought earth-shaking changes to the mountains and rivers here.
The processing of honeysuckle is not complicated, mainly drying and screening. From the mountain villages full of honeysuckle to the bustling streets of Xiaoshajiang, everyone in every household can be seen busy in front of their own drying rooms, putting freshly picked honeysuckle into "locally improvised" drying rooms and ovens to dry, or spreading it out in grain-drying yards to dry in the sun, and then picking out impurities such as branches and leaves. In front of every household, honeysuckle is laid out to dry, and the lingering fragrance of honeysuckle drifts everywhere.
On the slopes, people gather in small groups, many picking honeysuckle, including adults and children, most of them women. Nowadays, many young and strong laborers in rural areas have gone out to work. During the honeysuckle harvest season, family members are busy with drying, processing, and other tasks, so those picking honeysuckle are basically workers from outside the mountains, most of them students. Because it is vacation time and they have nothing to do at home, they can earn some tuition by picking honeysuckle for a few days. Some come together with classmates, and some are brought by their mothers. Every year from the end of June to the beginning of August, more than 200,000 mu of honeysuckle bloom all over the mountains and require a large number of people to pick. Many primary and middle school students can earn their tuition for the next semester within these two months. Each year, this can provide a cumulative 3 million workdays and create more than 60 million yuan in income for migrant workers.
At this time, it is even more interesting if you can visit a Yao family. In Huxingshan in the Xiaoshajiang area, there is an ancient and unique branch of the Yao ethnic group that was once forgotten in Chinese folklore materials. Independent of other Yao branches, they are enclosed in these wild mountains, faithfully passing on the most simple and pure life of their ancestors. Because of their brilliantly beautiful clothing, they have a beautiful name—Huayao, the Flower Yao. Standing in a sea of flowers and watching Huayao girls pick honeysuckle is a scene here. Sitting under towering ancient trees, drinking fragrant honeysuckle tea, and listening to Huayao girls and boys sing gives one an indescribable sense of pleasure.
Singing mountain songs is a unique skill of the Yao family. When entering a Yao village, girls hold large bowls of rice wine and will keep singing until the guest finishes the wine before allowing them to enter. At meals, girls in small groups take turns toasting guests in the form of singing, so that one cannot help but drink and get drunk. At night, around a blazing bonfire, girls and boys pull guests into their ranks in various ways, singing, dancing, and performing all kinds of programs together... The honeysuckle covering the mountains and plains, together with the magical natural scenery of the Xuefeng Mountains and the unique ethnic customs of the local Huayao people, has created a distinctive tourism brand that has brought vitality to tourism here.
Today, Xiaoshajiang has become the country's largest honeysuckle distribution center, with annual transactions reaching several hundred million yuan. Sales outlets for honeysuckle have also been set up in some famous medicinal markets across the country. At present, more than 300 people here are engaged in honeysuckle sales across the country. A number of newly developed products have been launched, including "Yinhua Health Tea," honeysuckle beverages, honeysuckle lozenges, honeysuckle facial cleanser, and honeysuckle toothpaste. They won special prizes, gold awards, and silver awards respectively at the Asia-Pacific Expo, the Hunan Agricultural Expo, and the World Agricultural Products Expo. Among them, "Yipeng" and "Yinxian" brand honeysuckle tea have been confirmed by the state as green food and are deeply favored and welcomed by consumers when put on the market.