Han Ximin

1824295095@qq.com

A TOTAL of 630,000 tons of vegetables under Shenzhen Customs’ administration have been sent from the mainland to Hong Kong on a yearly average since Hong Kong’s return to the motherland in 1997.

Between January and May this year, a total of 251,300 tons of vegetables were sent to Hong Kong, up by 17.13% year on year.

On Wednesday, at the production base of Gold Rock Agriculture Development Co. Ltd. in Guangming, workers sorted and packed vegetables before they were transported to Hong Kong via Wenjindu Checkpoint.

“Our production base offers 20-30 vegetable varieties to Hong Kong for four seasons. In Hong Kong markets, residents can find almost all the vegetables they need from the mainland produce market,” Zhu Yingming, manager of the company’s quality control department, said at an interview.

“There is an increasing demand for fresh vegetables from Hong Kong residents. The company’s exports to Hong Kong went up by 20% over the same period in 2021,” Zhu added.

With limited land space in Hong Kong, vegetables cannot be grown on a large scale. Since the 1950s, 90% of Hong Kong’s vegetables have been imported from the mainland. Exports of fresh produce and livestock via Shenzhen to Hong Kong take up 90% of the supplies in the Hong Kong market.

“Fresh vegetables transported from Shenzhen can be stocked in Hong Kong markets the following morning. It was unimaginable 20 years ago,” Li Dehui, manager of Shenzhen Leyi Foods Co. Ltd., a vegetable supplier engaged in the Hong Kong market for over 20 years. The company supplies Hong Kong with 15 tons of vegetables a day.