Zhu Youyong, the honorary president of Yunnan Agricultural University, is famous for his research in agriculture. It is his dream to use knowledge to improve farmers’ life. So, at the age of 60, Zhu went to Lancang, a small county in very poor condition to put his idea into practice.

But poverty alleviation（扶贫）is much harder than writing research papers. “You need people to understand you first and this is not always easy,” said Zhu. After getting to Lancang, Zhu soon found it a perfect place to plant winter potatoes. Once planted at year end, they can be fully grown after the Spring Festival. But the villagers did not have a habit of working during winter, and they thought the poverty alleviation teams were just there to give them money. “They didn’t believe me or wanted to work with me in the field,” said Zhu.

To change local people’s mind, Zhu decided to show them by growing potatoes himself. In just three months, the quantity（数量）and quality of the potatoes surprised the villagers and many volunteered to join Zhu’s team. For the past four years, Zhu has spent more than 100 days every year living and working in the village. He went from door to door to teach the villagers scientific farming methods. A villager named Zhang Liujin made over 20,000 yuan in his first try.“It was Zhu who taught me each and every step of how to plant the potatoes,” he said. “I’m so thankful and will never forget him.”

Here is a charity sale(义卖) for the poor children in the mountain area. We’ll give away the money we raise in the charity sale. Please come and have a look.

Larry

I have an MP4 player. I have owned it for a year. It still works very well now. It stays with me whenever I feel sad. And I have downloaded some pop songs and classic movies in it. I hope it can be with you when you are unhappy. It costs 150 dollars. Now, you can take it with 50 dollars.

Nancy

I have some soft toys to sell. The toy rabbit is my fifteen-year-old birthday present. I have had it for half a year. It still looks very new. It costs me 60 dollars. You only need to pay 16 dollars for it now. Other toys are also very new but cheap, too.

Judy

I’d like to sell some of my fictions. I started to buy fictions when I was thirteen years old. My favourite one is Treasure Island. I believe anyone like me will learn a lot from this fiction. Each book only costs 20 dollars. You can get the second one at half price.