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Chapter 23. Vanilla Production in China
Hengcang Zhou, Yunyue Wang, Hongyu Wang, Xurui, and Dexin Chen
History Vanilla Introduction and Industrial Development
In the early 1960s, Vanilla planifolia Andr. was successively introduced from Indonesia to the Fujian Institute of Subtropical Botany and from Sri Lanka to DanZhou in Hainan Province, and then to the Xishuangbanna region of Yunnan Province. From this point on, the study of its planting, cultivation, and curing began in China.
In the late 1980s and early 1990s, with the support of vanilla research institutions and their achievements in vanilla research, some companies were progressively established, dedicated to the industrial planting, and production of vanilla. By late 1999, the total vanilla planting area reached around 233 ha, mainly using intensive cultivation systems under artificial shading (Figure 23.1), of which 100 ha were distributed in various parts of Hainan Province and belonged to different companies (Chen, 2005), and 133 ha were distributed in the Xishuangbanna region of Yunnan Province (Figure 23.2), which included five plantations belonging to the largest vanilla producer in China, the Yunnan Vanilla Industry Ltd.
FIGURE 23.1 Vanilla growing in Hainan, China, showing an intensive cultivation system under artificial shade houses. (Courtesy of Chen Dexin.)
FIGURE 23.2 Map of China showing the regions of vanilla cultivation (black circles) in the Yunnan and Hainan provinces.
Owing to a high input in the early stages, a long production period, poor management, lack of capital support, unstable output, and natural disasters and so forth, many vanilla plantations were ruined. Until 2001, only about 30 ha of the vanilla plantations were running normally in Hainan Province (Mao, 2002). In Yunnan, the situation was similar with the bankruptcy of the Yunnan Vanilla Industry Ltd. in 2007; the intensive cultivation plantations and processing factory in Xishuangbanna were shut down, and only a few farmers were still planting vanilla. In the past, as the planting and production area frequently fluctuated, the volume of cured vanilla fluctuated greatly from very little to several tons each year.
On the basis of a summary of practical experience, Hainan and Yunnan researched and developed a “Company + Farmer Household” agricultural industrialization model to organize vanilla production. Vanilla producers and local government formulated preferential policies to encourage farmer households to develop market-oriented vanilla cultivation. The producers help farmer households to establish vanilla plantations and provide the relevant technical training and advice, and the farmer households sell their green beans to the producers at fixed prices. From 2002 to 2004, under this new cooperative organization and dispersed cultivation model, more than 70 farmer households in Hainan have planted over 14 ha of vanilla under areca or other trees, or in combination with artificial shade nets (Figures 23.3 and 23.4).
FIGURE 23.3 Vanilla growing in Hainan, China, showing a growing system under areca trees. (Courtesy of Zhou Hengcang.)
FIGURE 23.4 Vanilla growing in Hainan, showing farmer households growing vanilla. (Courtesy of Zhou Hengcang.)
The planting and production area of vanilla in Hainan Island (Figure 23.2) is now around 34 ha, which is divided into eight sections in Anding, Tunchang County, Wanning, and Qionghai City, and belongs to more than 100 farmer households or private companies. Depending on the management and growing systems, its average yield is about 75–300 kg of cured beans per hectare, and the total output is about 5 tons of cured beans per year, which can only satisfy China’s domestic consumption demands, with little left for exportation (Chen, 2009; personal communication).
Vanilla is now mainly cultivated and produced in the Hainan Region in China, since the bankruptcy of the biggest vanilla planting and production enterprise, the Yunnan Vanilla Industry Co., Ltd.
A Review of Vanilla Research in China
With the introduction of vanilla into China and the development of its industrial cultivation, the corresponding science and research academies and production corporations have done a good deal of work in many fields, including planting, manufacturing, pest control, biological characteristic research, and production research and development. By 2008, over 330 academic papers had been published in different periodicals; 7 masters’ degree papers and 2 monographs had been published; and over 10 patent applications and 4 national agricultural standards had been issued in China. Furthermore, the vanilla production corporations establish their own rules, regulations and standards on planting, manufacturing, and production.