Pinduoduo, one of China’s largest agriculture platforms, said it will help promote geographical indications and work with farmers to build agricultural food brands so that they can bring out the full value of their labors.
The company will promote more than 1,000 agricultural food products covering more than 400 regions and 100 geographical indications during its annual harvest festival, which officially kicked off on Aug. 17. Pinduoduo will not charge sales commissions on agricultural food products and will subsidize and promote them through its popular “10 Billion Program” and flash deals channels. More than 2,000 merchants are participating in the festival.
Demand for information on food provenance and an appreciation of local producers has surged in recent years, leading to a growing preference for direct-from-farm sales. To meet this consumer need, Pinduoduo has been working with farmers and agri-food merchants to improve their growing practices and increase their visibility by building agricultural brands. The company is also sharing consumer preference insights with farmers to help them refine their planting decisions.
As China’s largest agricultural platform, Pinduoduo has connected more than 16 million farmers to its nationwide customer base of more than 800 million buyers. The company also invests significant resources to help farmers adopt technology to raise their productivity and improve food quality and safety.
Pinduoduo announced it would launch a dedicated “10 Billion Agriculture Initiative” to face and address critical needs in the agricultural sector and rural areas. Profits from the second quarter and any potential profits in future quarters would be allocated to the initiative. The Initiative would not be driven by profit or commercial goals, but strive to facilitate the advancement of agritech, promote digital inclusion, and provide agritech talents and workers with greater motivation and a sense of achievement.
“We believe that investing in agriculture will reap outsized social benefits because agriculture is the nexus of food security and quality, public health and environmental sustainability,” said Chen Lei, Chairman and CEO of Pinduoduo, who will personally oversee the '10 Billion Agriculture Initiative'. “We are able to give back because our users have placed their trust in us. We are grateful for their consistent support and will continue to do our best to serve them and all our stakeholders.”
Earlier this month, Pinduoduo launched its annual Smart Agriculture Competition to encourage leading scientists and researchers to develop “one-click planting” technology for smallholder farmers in China to raise productivity and promote environmental sustainability.