Go deep in Lijiang: American expat plants avocados

Jiang Ziyuan is an American from Minnesota who earned his PhD at Kunming Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences. After graduation in 2018, he chose to grow avocados in the Taoyuan town of Yongsheng county, northwest Yunnan’s Lijiang city.

“The climate and ecology here attracted me,” he said. Located in the dry-hot valley of the Jinsha River (upper reach of the Yangtze), Taoyuan is a good place to grow the fruits of avocado, raspberry and passion fruit.

After 4 years of hard work, Jiang built a 10-hectare plantation for planting the fruits. Locals respect the expat a lot, calling him "Dr. Jiang".

Last year, his avocados were favored by the market and sold to first-tier Chinese cities such as Shanghai and Shenzhen.

Reporting by Liu Gao and Zhe Yingchao (Lijiang Daily); Trans-editing by Mo yingyi