At the start of autumn, over a thousand acres of chili pepper fields in Lufeng Village, Liutun Township, Xiuwen County, are flourishing. Among them, the 500 acres of large green peppers cultivated by the Xiuwen Kangxingyuan Planting and Breeding Farmers' Cooperative are heavily laden with fruit, covering the branches. In the fields, twenty to thirty workers are busy each day harvesting, sorting, and packaging the ripe peppers.
"We start at seven in the morning and work until seven in the evening, each person picking more than 1,000 jin of chili peppers daily," said local villager Zhong Yingfang. This year, Xiuwen County has leveraged its cool plateau mountainous climate to vigorously expand the chili pepper industry, bringing the county's total planting area to 37,500 acres.
Chili cultivation is mainly distributed across townships including Xiaoqing, Saping, Liutun, Jiuchang, Liuguang, Litong, and Gubao. The varieties grown range from bell peppers and linear peppers to facing-heaven peppers. Harvesting is now underway on a large scale, with production this year expected to exceed 80,000 tons. The produce is primarily destined for markets in Guangxi, Guangdong, Zhejiang, and Chongqing.