Helping farmers in China's Sichuan Province
How a partnership between Shell and non-government organisation Mercy Corps helped local farmers with their business and agricultural practices.
In Sichuan Province, China, Shell has partnered with Mercy Corps and other non-government organisations to assist 150 small-holder farmers who were affected by our operations.
A two-year advice and training programme was launched in 2014 to help the farmers improve their long-term livelihoods. It advised and trained farmers on agricultural practices for better-quality crops including seed selection, pest control and planting techniques. Business-focused workshops offered a foundation in marketing, accounting and sales promotion.
As a result, farmers planted higher-value black peanuts and sweet potatoes and expanded their sales reach with a new online store. In 2015, they almost doubled their revenue: their black peanuts are now sold nationwide and are popular with customers in big cities along the eastern coast.
The high quality of their sweet potatoes has earned them a sales agreement with a food processing plant.
The livelihood programme is part of Shell’s global strategic partnership with Mercy Corps, which is seeking to transform how companies and non-government organisations can benefit by working together.
How Shell and Mercy Corps are helping local farmers (Film footage and main image: Mercy Corps)
Shell Mercy Corps partnership, China
Duration: 1:02 minutes
Description:
In Sichuan Province, China, Shell has partnered with Mercy Corps and other non-government organisations to provide local farmers with advice and training to help improve agricultural practices, business management and marketing.
[Background music plays]
Instrumental music with strings, increasing in intensity, then gentling towards the end.
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Farmers near our operations in China’s Sichuan Province had one of their best harvest seasons in many years.
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Aerial footage of the hills and vegetation of China’s Sichuan Province, cutting to slightly panning footage of green fields.
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Their farm revenue almost doubled.
Thanks to a community livelihoods programme set up by Shell, Mercy Corps and local partners in 2014
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Slightly panning footage of a man working with a farming hand implement amongst his crops.
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Advice and training helped improve agricultural practices, business management and marketing
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Footage of a classroom scene, an instructor standing in front of the screen at the front of the class, gesturing towards the projected graphics on the screen. Close-up of a diary being paged through. Footage of an instructor standing in front of a flipchart, marker in hand, as she teaches.
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More valuable crops such as black peanuts and sweet potatoes are now grown and sold
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Four successive graphics appear onscreen.
- Two piles of black peanuts, one with shells, one without.
- A pile of peanuts in shell at frame-left and a small bowl of peanuts in shell alongside at frame-right.
- Nine unpeeled sweet potatoes
- One unpeeled sweet potato sliced into four pieces.
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A new online store reaches customers nationwide
[Video footage]
Rear view close up of someone holding a smartphone in their hands with an app open onscreen, cutting to a closer view of the open app with data displaying onscreen.
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Agreements have been signed with a food processing plant
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Footage of two men standing beside a scale in a room also containing a cupboard and marketing materials displayed on the walls. One man is holding a sack open while the other man tips peanuts from the bucket he is holding into the open sack.
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Boosting the farmers’ revenue and helping to stimulate local economic growth
[Video footage]
Footage of the two men in the setting previously described, sealing a box with tape, and one of the men stacks it on top of another box.
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The programme is part of a global partnership between Shell and Mercy Corps
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Footage of a classroom setting with the instructor walking amongst the students in the class while carrying a large piece of flipchart paper with writing on it.
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Seeking new ways for NGOs and companies to work together for mutual benefits
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Front view of a class of students/farmers, seated in rows. This cuts to more footage of a slightly more spacious classroom setting, this time with students seated in groups around tables, data displaying on the white screen at the front of the class.
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www.shell.com/mercycorps
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