On the afternoon of September 9th, inside the food deep-processing industrial park of Pingliang Industrial Park, over 30 journalists from the 2026 mainstream media 'Quality Gansu Tour' stepped into the workshop of Pingliang Guowei Junhan Biotechnology Co., Ltd. and were immediately drawn to the scene before them. In the packaging workshop, conveyor belts ran at a steady pace as bags of corn starch moved through automatic weighing, sealing, and coding processes before neatly coming off the line. Several forklifts shuttled back and forth, transporting stacked products directly to the factory gate, where a line of trucks waited to load—each one departing as soon as it was filled, with the next immediately pulling up to take its place.

'Orders are fully booked; when a truck arrives, it can't afford to wait,' said Ma Jifeng, the company's Chief Quality Officer and Food Safety Director, patting a freshly produced bag beside the conveyor belt. 'Industry-wide, operating rates are around 60% this year, but we're running at 80%.'

Quality control integrated into every step

This company, which settled in Pingliang in 2020, currently processes 1.5 million tons of corn annually and stands as one of the largest corn starch production bases in Northwest China. From contract signing to production launch, the first phase took just 252 days, setting a record dubbed the 'Pingliang Speed' of breaking ground, completing construction, starting operations, and achieving regulatory scale all within consecutive years. In 2025, the enterprise produced 382,000 tons of corn starch and generated an industrial output value of 1.894 billion yuan. From January to May this year, it produced 179,000 tons of corn starch and 69,000 tons of various corn by-products, with an industrial output value reaching 971 million yuan.

'Quality is the foundation of any enterprise,' Ma Jifeng explained to the visiting journalists. The company has invested 50 million yuan in building a digitalized intelligent production workshop, leveraging IoT technology for real-time monitoring across the entire process—from cleaning and soaking to grinding, separation, dehydration, drying, and finished packaging. Fully integrated into the Gansu Province Food Safety Smart Supervision Platform, the company promotes a 'transparent workshop' initiative with complete surveillance coverage at every production stage. An accompanying food traceability system ensures that everything from raw material intake to product sales can be queried and tracked at every step. The enterprise has earned honors including 'Advanced Enterprise in Pingliang Economic Development,' the 'Workers' Vanguard' title from the Gansu Provincial Federation of Trade Unions, and a spot among 'Gansu Province's Top 50 Private Enterprises.'

Corn 'squeezed dry' for maximum value

At Guowei Junhan, a single corn kernel yields multiple distinct products. The primary output is food-grade corn starch, used for vermicelli and noodles, pharmaceutical excipients, beer saccharification, and further processing into glucose and high-fructose corn syrup. The by-products are equally ingenious: corn protein powder, high in protein content, is a sought-after raw material for feed companies; steeped corn husks, after treatment, become high-quality roughage for ruminants; and corn germ oil, extracted from the germ, is rich in vitamin E and positioned in the premium edible oil segment. The enterprise has become a stable supplier to renowned companies such as COFCO Group, Shuanghui Group, Cargill Group, Tsingtao Brewery, and Three Gorges Pharmaceutical.

'Look over there—the corn protein powder just off the line doesn't even have time to cool before it's hauled away,' Ma Jifeng pointed to the other side of the facility. Next door, tanker trucks from Gansu Liangwei Biotechnology arrive daily to collect starch for synthesizing pharmaceutical intermediates, with products exported to more than 40 countries worldwide. Further out, Gansu Xin Yangshao Biotechnology collects Guowei's corn husks and protein powder as fermentation substrates to produce feed additives, maintaining a sales rate of over 95% year-round. 'Raw materials leave our facility and, without leaving the park, enter the next company's production line.'

This exactly illustrates the intent behind Pingliang Industrial Park's decision to bring in Guowei Junhan in the first place—'bring in a leading dragon head, cultivate an entire industrial chain.'

From food ingredient to battery material

Beyond traditional applications, Pingliang Guowei Junhan's corn starch is venturing into the new energy battery sector. Ma Jifeng revealed, 'Corn starch, through high-temperature carbonization, can be processed into a material called hard carbon, used as the anode for sodium-ion batteries—it's lower cost and more widely sourced than graphite.' A domestic company has already built the world's first large-scale hard carbon anode production line using corn starch as the precursor, with raw materials sourced from Pingliang Guowei Junhan. From food, pharmaceutical, and chemical inputs to new energy battery materials, the value of a single corn kernel is being redefined.

As a core chain-leading enterprise in Pingliang's biomanufacturing industrial chain, Guowei Junhan continues to expand capacity and extend its chain. In June this year, a 500 million yuan investment project for a 200,000-ton annual glucose and high-fructose corn syrup production line broke ground and is expected to be completed and operational by June 2027. With Guowei as the anchor, companies like Liangwei Biotechnology and Xin Yangshao Biotechnology are positioning themselves along the chain, giving initial shape to a complete 'corn-starch-pharmaceutical intermediates/enzyme preparations' industrial chain. In 2025, the biomanufacturing sector in Pingliang Industrial Park generated an output value of 2.2 billion yuan.

Reassuring farmers with guaranteed contracts

Journalists were most keen to understand the enterprise's impact on local agriculture and farmers. 'We implement a contract farming model with guaranteed floor-price purchases, channeling market demand directly to the fields—farmers don't worry about selling or price fluctuations,' Ma Jifeng said. Each year, the company signs purchase agreements with large-scale growers and cooperatives, setting a floor price: when market prices rise, it follows the market; when they fall, the floor price protects farmers. Over the past three years, the company has purchased more than 2 million tons of corn, benefiting 500,000 farming households across 2 million mu of planted area, with an average household income increase exceeding 2,000 yuan.

Contract farming has transformed more than just sales channels. The company pushes standardization upstream, guiding farmers to cultivate specialized corn varieties suited for processing and to follow company standards for fertilization and crop management. 'Previously, farmers decided what and how to grow on their own. Now, whatever variety and quality the enterprise needs, we guide them to cultivate,' Ma Jifeng explained. 'This has shifted Pingliang's corn cultivation from scattered, rough practices to large-scale, standardized operations.'

Once contracts are in place, the supporting transportation sector has also flourished. Dozens of trucks queue at the factory gate year-round, with the enterprise shipping over a million tons of products annually, keeping nearly a thousand local transport vehicles busy. Many farmers have purchased three-wheeled carts or trucks—farming during busy seasons and hauling goods during idle times, earning income both on and off the farm. 'Raw materials come in, products go out—every ton moves by truck,' Ma Jifeng noted. 'We've calculated that logistics alone generates over 30 million yuan annually for local transport operators.'

The enterprise also provides jobs for nearly 500 local residents. Many workers split their time, working the fields in the morning and the factory in the afternoon, with flexible seasonal scheduling and stable year-round employment. 'Farming has guaranteed returns, factory work provides wages, and trucking brings in income' has become the norm for surrounding households. With a major buyer at their doorstep, growing corn and hauling goods have become reliable livelihoods.

As the tour concluded and journalists exited the factory, trucks from across the country waiting to load had already formed another line at the gate. The conveyor belts kept turning, corn kept turning into products heading out nationwide. The chain-driven transformation of a single corn kernel continues on.