As the chill of winter deepens and the orchards enter their dormant period, Dong Xiaomei, a provincial people's congress representative and general manager of Qin'an County Guiyuanhong Fruit Industry Co., Ltd., remains as busy as ever. When met, she was preparing to bring exquisitely packaged Qin'an apples to Lanzhou to participate in the "Taste Gansu, Seek New Year Flavors" New Year market.

In 2015, witnessing the plight of her hometown's bountiful apple harvest struggling with poor sales, Dong Xiaomei resolutely left her city job. Driven by her original aspiration to "ensure fellow villagers can both grow and sell their produce at better prices," she returned to Qin'an to devote herself to the apple industry. Elements of apples are ubiquitous in her life: from her WeChat name and stickers to her daily conversation topics. "My phone stores contact details for 5,660 fruit farmers, who can reach me anytime they have problems," Dong Xiaomei said. Having traveled extensively through Qin'an's major apple-producing townships, her notebook is filled with various bottlenecks encountered in planting and storage processes – "the outflow of young adults from rural areas leads to an aging workforce and outdated techniques," "imprecise grading prevents high-quality fruit from fetching good prices." These firsthand insights have become her "compass" for fulfilling her duties.

Under Dong Xiaomei's leadership, Guiyuanhong Fruit Industry has established a digital fruit selection workshop and fresh-keeping cold storage, introduced intelligent sorting equipment, and built an integrated production-supply-marketing mechanism encompassing "origin wholesale markets + cold chain logistics + bases + farmers + markets." By connecting with major e-commerce platforms online and setting up sales branches while forming long-term partnerships with large supermarkets offline, the company has successfully打通ed the entire apple industry chain.

"During this year's provincial Two Sessions, I will propose suggestions focused on extending the apple industry chain – aiming not only to 'lengthen' the industrial chain but, more importantly, to 'fatten' fellow villagers' wallets and make our hometown brand more 'renowned'," Dong Xiaomei stated. She expressed that through measures such as strengthening brand awareness, standardizing brand management, promoting industrial integration, and driving growth with technological innovation, they will build up the reputation of "Ganwei" brands like Qin'an apples and Huaniu apples, extend the industrial chain, enhance added value, and let "a single apple" link together profits across the entire chain.