Qionzhong Rolls Out Two-Waiver Two-Guarantee Policy to Boost Local Agarwood Rural Industry in Hainan

According to Hainan Daily, Qionzhong Li and Miao Autonomous County has formally launched a comprehensive pro-farmer policy package for its native agarwood sector, building a four-way win-win operational framework linking leading industrial firms, village collectives, individual growers and local financial institutions. The model guided by local authorities, industrial operators and financial support injects fresh momentum into the time-honoured local speciality sector.

Nestled within the core zone of ancient Limu Mountain Eastern Valley, Qionzhong stands as a historic birthplace and prime producing region for Hainan agarwood. Ranked foremost among the four revered aromatic materials of agarwood, sandalwood, dragon’s blood and musk, local agarwood was once presented as imperial tribute goods. Ethnic Li and Miao communities have preserved millennium-old customs of planting and utilising aromatic trees, laying deep cultural foundations for the trade. Hainan provincial authorities have incorporated agarwood into its key industrial cultivation scheme dubbed Six Tree Industries, issuing dedicated development plans that target a provincial planting area of 180,000 mu by 2030. Qionzhong advances full industrial chain development while capitalising on this provincial policy framework.

Consistent industrial upgrading has taken place across Qionzhong in recent years. The county’s total agarwood planting area exceeds 30,000 mu, covering ten townships, alongside a ten-thousand-mu fine seedling base and a national-level germplasm resource nursery for agarwood trees. A digital traceability system labelled One Tree, One Certificate, One Code has been rolled out across the region, with multiple deep processing production lines established at Wanling Agricultural Processing and Logistics Park. Handcrafted aromatic goods and cultural derivatives from Qionzhong have claimed major honours including the Gold Magnolia Prize at the China-Arab Fragrance Expo and Silver Awards at national characteristic tourism commodity contests, steadily lifting market recognition of the regional public brand Qionzhong Agarwood.

Rural growers have long faced four core obstacles when participating in agarwood cultivation: insufficient technical guidance, inconsistent product quality, unstable sales channels and uncertain revenue returns. To resolve these concerns, Qionzhong county government has partnered with Hainan Daguan Agarwood Industry Development Co., Ltd and Hainan Rural Commercial Bank Qionzhong Sub-branch to design and implement the Two-Waiver Two-Guarantee support scheme.

The Two-Waiver provisions address technical barriers and market trust issues respectively. Full-cycle technical services are supplied free of charge; specialists from the Chinese Academy of Tropical Agricultural Sciences and Chinese Academy of Forestry conduct on-site training and guidance covering seedling breeding, field maintenance, resin induction and raw material harvesting via the county’s national agarwood science and technology station. Digital traceability tags and exclusive chips are provided without extra cost for every agarwood tree, creating verifiable digital records that enable full quality tracking and formalised property rights transfer of aromatic forest assets.

The Two-Guarantee clauses lock in stable revenue streams for all participating households. A guaranteed minimum resin yield clause commits the industrial operator to a baseline output of 500 grams of aromatic resin per tree after six years of cultivation, mitigating risks arising from the crop’s lengthy maturation cycle. A guaranteed floor purchase price mechanism ensures all harvested agarwood from local farmers is fully bought at a fixed baseline rate of 0.5 yuan per gram, with growers entitled to all price premiums generated during market upturns. Calculated on a standard planting density of 150 trees per mu, the minimum aggregate income per mu over six years reaches 37,500 yuan. Annual net returns after deducting cultivation costs surpass 4,000 yuan per mu, delivering predictable, steady earnings for household growers.

Targeted financial instruments deliver sustained capital input across the industrial chain. Hainan Rural Commercial Bank Qionzhong Sub-branch has introduced a dedicated Agarwood Industry Loan product with a total credit quota of five billion yuan. Daguan Agarwood provides full joint liability guarantees, removing requirements for additional collateral from individual farmers. Repayment terms match the six-to-eight-year growth cycle of agarwood trees, with maximum personal credit terms extending to ten years and flexible repayment plans including equal principal and interest instalments and interest-only payments with lump-sum principal settlement upon maturity. The branch has extended credit support to 174 industry operators to date, with cumulative lending exceeding 30 million yuan.

This industrial framework offers practical solutions for repurposing degraded areca nut plantations affected by yellowing disease across county territories. Agarwood trees are not host plants for the pathogen causing areca yellowing disorder and adapt well to affected plots, supporting intercropping layouts alongside rubber and areca nut trees to revitalise underutilised woodland resources. Pilot sites for the Two-Waiver Two-Guarantee scheme have been prioritised in townships with concentrated diseased areca fields, covering four signed village collectives and 26 household growers across 600 mu of standardised agarwood plantations. Digital property certificates under the One Tree, One Certificate, One Code system are issued to all trees, allowing online pre-sale listings three years post resin induction once trees mature, establishing complete circulation channels for aromatic forestry assets.

Local authorities advance three key lines of work to expand wealth-generating opportunities delivered by agarwood cultivation. Brand competitiveness will be strengthened through broader online and offline sales distribution networks. A comprehensive industrial service system will be refined, integrating seedling subsidies, technical training, specialised financing, brand operation and market matching services. The geographic reach of the Two-Waiver Two-Guarantee pilot programme will keep expanding to lengthen industrial chains and lift product value tiers, bringing extra revenue to village collectives and rural households county-wide.