In the blink of an eye, it was November 15th.
Jiang Miao went to the cannery for an inspection.
"Boss, this is our new soft-pouch canning production line..." Li Xinhua, dressed in a protective suit and respiratory hood, explained the line’s status to him.
The line wasn’t heavily automated. Its core components were the sterilization and sealing equipnt; the rest of the process was handled by workers.
It wasn’t that Hailufeng Company couldn’t afford automated equipnt, but rather that it wasn’t cost-effective. Besides, a large workforce could be an advantage in itself.
Jiang Miao, also in a protective suit and respiratory helt, picked up a pouch of kabayaki eel. It contained a whole eel, mainly supplied to sushi bars and Japanese restaurants.
"Is this the first official production batch?"
"Yes. I scheduled 2,000 units for the first batch to test the market’s reaction."
Jiang Miao nodded. "Good. Coordinate with the e-comrce departnt. By the way, what’s our eel inventory look like?"
Li Xinhua imdiately explained, "Currently, the farm culls 5,000 white eels every fifteen days. The tinplate cannery line can process 1,000 eels a day, and the soft-pouch line can also handle 1,000 a day. Our current inventory can only support about two or three days of production. To save costs, I’ve scheduled the tinplate can production first, then we’ll halt that line and shift the employees to the soft-pouch side. This ensures ten production days per month."
Jiang Miao was already aware of this.
And Li Xinhua’s strategy was sound. So of the cannery’s production line employees were paid for two weeks of work, and if the line ran for a full month, they would receive a full month’s salary.
The cannery’s production line employees were currently all D1 Level, with a monthly salary of 3,500 yuan. als were included, but not housing.
Working for two weeks was counted as half a month, for an actual pay of 1,750 yuan. The company also covered their five social insurance contributions, which weren’t deducted from the employees’ base salary.
The pay didn’t seem high, but many locals were still flocking to the opportunity.
The main draws were the included als and the company-paid social insurance. Many line workers would have gladly worked a full month if they could, but the farm simply didn’t have enough culled eels. As a result, they could only produce for one week and then rest for another.
After inspecting the cannery, Jiang Miao was driven directly to the farm.
Construction on the new cultivation base was proceeding around the clock.
The open-air fishponds they had acquired were also being put into use one by one. Mature eels purchased from various regions were being introduced into these ponds for customized feeding.
His brother-in-law and father had always managed these matters, so he went straight to his seed laboratory.
The first batch of planted strawberries had begun to flower, and so of the early-maturing varieties were already bearing fruit.
A middle-aged employee in charge of daily work in the greenhouse saw him approaching and quickly put down his watering can.
"Boss."
"Old Lin, how are the strawberries doing today?"
Old Lin quickly replied, "Boss, I think so of the strawberries should be ripe today."
Jiang Miao went to the shipping container office to get a refractoter and a notebook.
Li Wenna also helped, grabbing a portable plastic case that contained small boxes, labels, scissors, and paper towels.
Inside the greenhouse, the 35 varieties of strawberry seedlings had been separated into small sections with plastic film partitions. This was to prevent cross-pollination and maintain the genetic purity of each variety.
Through ongoing propagation via runners, each variety had been cultivated into seven or eight plants.
The ones currently bearing ripe fruit were all the original mother plants. The newly propagated plants would need at least another month before they could flower and fruit.
"Boss, it’s this variety here."
Jiang Miao glanced at the label stuck in the grow bag: C12.
The plant had six strawberries hanging from it: three red, three green.
One of the red strawberries was indeed ripe, because he could see the data on his identification panel.
He snipped it off with the scissors, gave it a quick rinse, and then cut the strawberry into five pieces. One piece was set aside for its seeds. He then took another piece, squeezed its juice out, and dripped it onto the refractoter.
Sweetness: 14.8. ’That’s a decent level,’ Jiang Miao thought. While it couldn’t compare to top-tier Dandong Strawberries, he was more interested in its shape, as this variety’s strengths were its large size and long shelf life.
"You two have a taste."
The three of them tasted it carefully.
"It’s very sweet, but with a hint of tartness. The flesh is quite firm," Li Wenna said, sharing her impression.
"Mmm, it is sweet," Old Lin said, having practically swallowed his piece whole.
Jiang Miao held the piece of fruit on his tongue, carefully savoring all of its various flavors.
First, there was sweetness, followed by a slight tartness, and then the unique fragrance of the strawberry. This fragrance was a mix of cantaloupe and jasmine, though it was quite faint and required careful tasting to notice.
He recorded these flavor profile evaluations one by one in his notebook.
He then found 11 more varieties with ripe fruit and repeated the process: taking a sample, testing the sweetness, tasting, and recording the results.
From this hands-on evaluation, he imdiately eliminated three varieties. Their flavors were simply too strange: one had a slightly muddy taste, another had a noticeable bitterness, and the third was as bland as water.
The more valuable finds were varieties C22 and C26.
C22’s flavor was very similar to the Shogun Strawberry, but with a more pronounced creamy note. It was also heat-resistant, able to withstand the 35-degree Celsius highs of a Lingnan sumr, which would help ensure its sweetness, disease resistance, flavor, and yield.
C26’s flavor was unlike any typical strawberry. It had a unique vanilla taste combined with notes similar to passion fruit. Its only weakness was its inability to tolerate temperatures above 30 degrees Celsius, aning it could only be grown during Lingnan’s winter season.
Of course, the other seven remaining varieties also had their own rits.
Take C12, the first one he tried. Its fruit was quite large, capable of reaching the size of a duck egg, and its yield was also very high. He estimated a greenhouse could produce about 4.5 to 5 tons per mu.
Given that C12’s flavor and sweetness were good, combined with its resistance to Lingnan’s sumr heat and its long shelf life, this variety also had comrcial value.
After tasting the first batch of fruiting varieties and recording the relevant data, Jiang Miao already had a plan forming in his mind.
First of all, the greenhouse at the farm was definitely not going to be enough.
After all, a single ripe strawberry contains 150 to 200 seeds. Combined with propagation by runners, they could cultivate a huge number of seedlings very quickly.
The planting density was about 5,000 to 6,000 seedlings per mu.
There were at least five or six varieties in the greenhouse that warranted an initial expansion of cultivation, and each variety would require at least five mu of land.
In other words, he would need at least 30 mu of land.
Fortunately, there was plenty of abandoned farmland in Salt Town Village. He planned to rent 100 mu of vegetable plots nearby to build a strawberry greenhouse complex.
Once he had the cultivation base, selling either the strawberries directly or the seedlings would be a good business.
However, Jiang Miao didn’t plan on giving this task to his brother-in-law and father. The eel farm was already keeping them busy enough. Adding a strawberry farm would stretch them too thin, and things would inevitably fall through the cracks.
Therefore, he decided to hire another manager specifically for the strawberry farm.
Fortunately, the company was maturing. Jiang Miao directly instructed Li Wenna to notify Jiang Haibo in the HR departnt to recruit a non-local with farm managent experience.
At the sa ti, he also had Li Wenna tell Wang Feng in the purchasing departnt to rent a plot of about 100 mu of vegetable land in Salt Town Village or one of the nearby villages in Magong Town to serve as the strawberry cultivation base.
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