Editor's note

Investigation and research is the heirloom of our Party, and it is also an important magic weapon for solving development problems, promoting high-quality development, and realizing Chinese-style modernization in the new era. Over the past year, the CPC Central Committee has repeatedly stressed the need to "vigorously promote the trend of investigation and research."

In order to promote the investigation and research to be deeper and more practical, find out the crux of the constraints on development, and then seek solutions, Nanfang Daily and Nanfang + Client will launch the "Research +" column from now on, inviting experts from all walks of life to form a research team to go to the front line of the economy for immersive and experiential research, jointly discover new problems, summarize new experiences, explore new laws, and find the password for high-quality economic development, so stay tuned.

In the fingerling cultivation workshop of the Hengsheng Aquaculture Professional Cooperative (hereinafter referred to as the "Cooperative") in Shapao Town, Yangxi County, Yangjiang Province, rows of cultivation barrels are lined up, and schools of different species of fish such as pearl grouper, dragon grouper and barramundi swim back and forth.

"In addition to the cultivation of marine seedlings, the cooperative plans to further expand its scale in the future, and is also preparing to expand its business such as oyster farming, recreational fishery, and deep-sea cage culture, and we need financial support." Lin Liquan, chairman of the cooperative, said.

Guangdong was born because of the sea, and it should be prosperous and strong because of the sea. The Third Plenary Session of the 13th Provincial Party Committee emphasized that it is necessary to comprehensively promote the construction of a strong maritime province and make new breakthroughs in building a new maritime Guangdong. Since the beginning of this year, Guangdong has clearly proposed the implementation of the "finance + marine" project. For financial institutions, what business space has Guangdong's vigorous development of marine ranching brought? What financial resources do you need to support marine ranching? How can financial resources better escort the construction of marine ranches? In this issue of research+, the reporter and financial experts from the banking and insurance industries walked into Yangjiang, the prefecture-level city with the largest number and area of national marine ranching demonstration zones in Guangdong Province, to find answers.

●Nanfang Daily reporter Zhou Meilin and Zhang Yan are from Yangjiang

Innovate and optimize financial security

Reduce the cost of financing marine ranching

Seawater seedlings are known as the "chips" of marine aquaculture, and are a strategic and basic core industry for the development of marine ranching. "In the past, the breeding of marine fish fry could only 'watch the sky and eat', but now through the transformation of the cultivation environment through science and technology, the water temperature, light, salinity and disease control can be controlled, and the fry can spawn all year round." Lin Liquan said.

Guangdong's vigorous development of marine ranches and the construction of marine granaries have opened up new development space for the fish fry breeding industry in Yangxi County. Lin Liquan introduced that the cooperative has formed a circular production chain of "broodstock-fish eggs-fish fry-finished fish", with an annual output of more than 3 million commercial fish fry and an output value of more than 1 million yuan.

The development of the industry needs financial support. "With the support of a multi-million yuan loan from CCB, our business is getting bigger and bigger." Lin Liquan said.

Under the nourishment of financial "living water", more and more farmers like Lin Liquan are looking to the sea, and Guangdong's "blue granary" is more abundant.

"The construction of marine ranching is a key planning project in Yangjiang City, and we have continuously innovated and optimized our services in recent years to provide financial guarantee for the development of marine ranching." Yuan Yebo, deputy general manager of the inclusive finance business department of Yangjiang branch of China Construction Bank, said that the marine ranching industry chain has become a "new blue ocean" for the bank's business.

Yuan Yebo is an "old friend" of many farmers in Shapao Town, and it is his daily work to understand the financial needs of enterprises in the countryside. In the town of Shapao, farming enterprises like Hengsheng Aquatic Products that have a need for capital are not unique.

"Our company plans to further expand the scale of factory farming, and is also preparing to build a marine fish culture museum to build an industry-university-research and science popularization base, which requires a lot of funds." Chen Chao, general manager of Yangxi Jinyuan Marine Biological Research Co., Ltd. and president of Yangjiang Seawater Seed Industry Innovation and Development Association, also had deep feelings about this.

The prospect of marine ranching is broad, and continuous capital investment is an important part of its construction. How to give full play to the power of finance to do a good job in the "sea"?

Since the beginning of this year, Guangdong has issued a series of documents such as the "2023 Guangdong Financial Support for High-quality Economic Development Action Plan", proposing to implement the "Finance + Ocean" project to help form a new growth point for marine ranches and open up new space for high-quality development.

"In our previous research, we found that farmers need more liquidity during the peak season of fish fry production and marketing. In addition, in order to cope with the huge market demand, many enterprises also have a strong demand for credit to expand their production scale. Yuan Yebo introduced.

However, from the bank's point of view, marine fish fry farmers and related small and micro enterprises are small in scale, weak in their ability to cope with market risks, and lack of collateral, which has always been a credit pain point.

The relevant person in charge of Yangjiang Agriculture and Rural Bureau said that in recent years, Yangjiang has continuously innovated and optimized the financial security of marine ranches, strengthened financial policy guidance, structural tool support, financial product and service optimization, innovated green financial products and models, and further reduced the financing cost of marine ranches.

"The bank understood our capital needs before and took the initiative to provide a credit loan of 80,<> yuan, with a very favorable interest rate." Chen Chao said that the loan has effectively supplemented the company's working capital, "The development goals that may have been achieved in the five-year plan may now be achieved in three years." ”

"With the exemplary role of Jinyuan Marine's loan, many members of the association have become our customers." Yuan Yebo said that the bank has launched many innovative products for the marine ranching industry, accelerated the innovation of financial products and services, implemented preferential interest rate policies for loans, opened green channels for approval, and formulated exclusive financial plans to better serve seedling cultivation, aquaculture and processing enterprises in the whole process.

Insurance weaves a dense "safety net"

Multi-faceted escort for fishery production

In Hebei Village, Shangyang Township, Yangxi County, offshore fishing rafts are being dismantled and replaced by round, deep-sea cages dotted farther afield, the fishermen's "new pasture".

"There are many benefits of deep-sea farming, fish are less susceptible to disease, have a high survival rate, taste better, and sell better." Yu Qiu, head of Yangxi Chaolin Aquaculture Co., Ltd., said that the company has successively invested in 18 cages, with an annual output value of about 2000 million yuan.

However, the fact that aquaculture is moving deep into the sea means that it is exposed to an environment where natural risks are exacerbated. "When a typhoon hits, it may cause serious losses." Yu Shaojun, head of Yangjiang Yu's Seafood Trading Co., Ltd., told reporters that in 2022, Typhoon "Chaba" tore a large number of cages in Yangjiang, and fish fled.

In the survey, financial experts generally believe that due to the complex production environment of marine ranches, the company of wind and waves, and the high temperature of storms, ship collisions, epidemic pollution, etc., which affect the stability of the operation, face greater risks, and the lack of effective risk protection for business entities was once very prominent.

"The introduction of insurance protection is an effective way to diversify the risk of marine ranching." Li Xueguang, deputy director of Yangxi County Agriculture and Rural Bureau, said. Under the promotion of the government department, PICC P&C Guangdong Branch has launched a risk disaster index insurance product for seawater cage aquaculture, filling the gap of lack of protection for local farmers. As of October this year, a total of 10 million yuan of risk protection has been provided for 101 deep-sea cages in Yangxi County, including Xitou Town, Shapao Town, and Shangyang Town.

Different from traditional insurance to verify compensation based on losses, index insurance "as long as the threshold is exceeded, the loss of farmers does not need to be verified and directly paid, which is more efficient," said the relevant person in charge of PICC property insurance. This means that the insurance company is responsible for compensation in accordance with the provisions of the insurance contract only if a tropical cyclone is encountered in the sea area where the subject of insurance is located and the wind level reaches or exceeds the minimum compensation line agreed in the insurance contract during the insurance period.

Yu Shaojun was the first local person to eat crabs, and was compensated 160.40 million yuan during typhoons "Taili" and "Sula" this year. "Thanks to the government's good policy, we only need to pay 60% of the premium, and the government subsidizes <>% of the majority, which reduces the pressure of insurance and makes us more at ease to do deep-sea aquaculture."

Coincidentally, Yangxi Chaolin Aquaculture Co., Ltd. also received a claim of about 81,<> yuan in this year's typhoon season, which alleviated the financial pressure to a certain extent.

With protection as the fulcrum, more insurance resources are inclined to marine ranching. In March this year, PICC P&C Yangjiang Branch set up the Yangjiang Marine Ranch Service Center, focusing on "guarantee + service + innovation", setting up seven major functions: risk protection, expert talks, skills training, meteorological early warning, catastrophe emergency, digital empowerment, and assistance to the association, so as to escort regional fishery production in a multi-faceted way.

Taking catastrophe emergency as an example, the Marine Ranch Service Center will push disaster meteorological warnings, reminding farmers to replace their nets in advance to avoid damage and leakage of fish, avoid damage to old nets, draw fish in advance, and return to port in advance to reduce the impact of wind and waves.

It is worth mentioning that trapped in the deep-sea cage aquaculture scale is difficult to count and other technical limitations, the insurance industry has the problem of difficult loss assessment, the current insurance protection is mainly based on index insurance, need to rely on the third-party data provided by the meteorological department for damage assessment, and there is a gap between the damage assessment results and the actual damage. "Modern marine ranches need more complete and accurate insurance protection, and we look forward to technological progress to make a qualitative leap in financial services for marine ranching." Li Xueguang said.

Race to the sea and sail strongly, and ride the waves. Through this survey, we see that under the call of the policy, supporting the construction of marine ranches has become a "new blue ocean" for the business of many financial institutions in Guangdong, and by increasing the investment of financial resources, "living water" continues to flow to the construction of marine ranches and moistens the entire industrial chain of marine economy. Planner/Coordinator: Chen Ying

(Nanfang Daily)