Yulin Hemp Textile: From Street Workshop To Designated Production Enterprise Of Ministry Of Textile

When interviewing Great Wall Machinery Factory and Yulin flue-cured tobacco factory in tangbuling Industrial Zone, we passed by the gate of a factory many times, and saw the frequent traffic in and out of the plant area, which was full of excitement. Nearby residents introduce that this is the former site of Yulin hemp textile factory. As a once brilliant Yulin star enterprise, what kind of story does Yulin hemp textile mill have? Recently, we once again came to tangbuling industrial zone and walked into the original Yulin hemp textile factory.

The buildings in the production area are basically newly built

The living area remains the same

The gate of the plant area is of flat top design, and there are lattice windows between the columns on both sides. There are small walls on both sides of the gate, with patterns of textile threads on them.

Walking into the production area, you can see the tall office building. The bougainvillea in the small garden on the guardrail is covered with red flowers. "The original factory buildings and office buildings have been basically demolished. Now the buildings in the production area are built by later companies." Lu Qiang, former director of the office of Yulin hemp textile factory, introduced.

The living area and the production area are only more than 100 meters apart. At present, the original appearance is basically maintained. The door is tall and elegant, with concrete lattice fence above. Living area, planted with osmanthus, jackfruit and other plants.

Go straight in and you'll find the residential building. The residential building is 4 storeys high. In front of the building, there is a fish pond in the shape of love, and there are rockeries in the fish pond. Today, there are still some workers living in the former Yulin hemp textile factory. "The living area covers an area of 42000 square meters, with 4 residential buildings and 5 bungalows." Lu Qiang.

Street workshops developed into large enterprises

According to reports, the predecessor of Yulin hemp textile mill is a small hemp textile mill established in wuwuwuzhai, West Street, urban area in 1977. At that time, there were only 60 employees and 8 old iron and wood machines, with an annual output of only 100000 sacks. In 1979, Qin Dewei, the chief engineer of the production department of the Central Textile Ministry, and Zhou Zide, an engineer from the textile department of the autonomous region, went to Yulin to investigate and concluded that it was the right time for Yulin to establish a large-scale hemp textile factory. As a result, hemp textile mills ushered in a new life.

"Yulin, located in the subtropical zone, is a jute producing area in southern Guangxi, with an annual area of 6666.66 hectares." Lu Qiang said that it is the advantages of Yulin that relevant experts decided to set up a large-scale hemp textile factory in Yulin.

With the approval of the autonomous region, Yulin hemp textile mill was selected to be located in tangbuling Industrial Zone in 1980, and construction started in March of that year to prepare for the construction of a half set (52 sets of cloth machines) production scale of hemp textile mill.

After the establishment of the factory, the factory began to recruit workers and sent them to advanced domestic production enterprises for training in batches. Wu Zhiying, who is now the president of Yulin Chinese Medicine Hong Kong Chamber of Commerce, still remembers that she was admitted to Yulin hemp textile factory after graduating from high school and became one of the first batch of workers in the factory. "At that time, I went to Guangdong Wuchuan hemp textile factory to learn spinning technology, and returned to work in the factory three months later." At first, Wu Zhiying was a spinning worker. Two years later, due to her excellent performance, she transferred to quality control.

In May 1981, Yulin hemp textile factory was officially put into operation, and the profit was more than 100000 yuan in that year. According to Lu Qiang, in 1981, Yulin hemp textile factory was divided into two production workshops, namely, the textile department and the weaving department. At the same time, the mechanical and electrical workshop was set up as an auxiliary workshop to be responsible for motor maintenance and spare parts production. In 1982, it was divided into four workshops, namely, the front spinning workshop, the after spinning workshop, the weaving workshop and the finished product workshop. Due to the rapid production and quick effect, Yulin hemp textile mill has been expanding its production. In 1983, it has become a new type of hemp textile mill with a complete set of equipment (104 cloth machines).

Employees go to all parts of the country for exchange and study

The products are popular

It is understood that Yulin hemp textile mill to "6635-927g" national standard sacks as the main products, while selling some strands. Later, we also produced many kinds of single warp and double warp plain woven sacks and sacks, and designed various types of sacks according to the needs of users. The products were sold to all over the country and Southeast Asian countries.

"After the factory was put into operation, more than 3000 product introductions were printed and distributed to relevant units and users in various cities." Lu Qiang said that in 1982, Su Xishan, then the director of the Yulin hemp textile factory, led a team to Shanxi, Shaanxi, Sichuan and other places to understand the market situation of gunny bags and sell them. In May 1984, Zhang Chengye, deputy director of the factory, led the supply and marketing personnel to participate in the national food packaging technology exchange meeting held in Zhengzhou, Henan Province. After that, he went to some provinces and cities in Central China and Northeast China to learn about the market situation, and asked more than 20 old users for opinions on the production, quality and sales of hemp bags in hemp textile mills. At that time, Yulin hemp textile factory was booming.

Later, Yulin hemp textile factory became a hemp textile enterprise designated by the Ministry of textile of the people's Republic of China. According to reports, at that time, the raw materials selected by the factory were of good quality and high strength. The traditional product "6635-927g" national standard gunny bags had a compact structure and high strength, and could be used to hold 100 kg of rice, wheat, sugar and soda ash, which were welcomed by the majority of users. In addition, "6635-70g" national standard sacks, "6630-650 grams" national standard sacks have also won praise from foreign merchants.

Promote the development of medical institutions, schools and other supporting facilities

The prosperity of Yulin hemp textile mill has also led to the development of other supporting facilities.

At that time, there was a certain distance between the factory area and Yulin city. In order to facilitate the life of employees, Yulin hemp textile factory built a medical institution with a construction area of 315 square meters and 7 medical staff. In the early days of the establishment of the factory, kindergartens were set up and nurseries were added in 1983. After that, it cooperated with Yulin No.4 bicycle factory, tobacco factory, cigarette factory, refrigeration plant and other nearby enterprises to raise funds and teachers to set up tangbuling Industrial Zone workers' children's school. In the initial stage, only primary school classes were set up, and after 1982, junior middle school classes were added.

The school for the children of employees in tangbuling industrial zone has been running until the early 1990s, and then it has been changed into Huanxi school in Yuzhou District. In 2010, it was changed to Yulin special education school.

The development of new products in the predicament once reversed the decline

"In 1984, a new product development was carried out in the bast mill." Lu Qiang introduced that at that time, the domestic sack market reached saturation state, and there was a serious backlog of gunny bag products, which made Yulin hemp textile mill face difficulties in capital turnover. In order to reverse this situation, Yulin hemp textile factory sent a group of informants to investigate the market demand at that time. Later, according to the collected information, the company has developed "6635-626g" national standard gunny bag, "6630-845g" national standard gunny bag, and other varieties of sacks and linen.

"In 1986, after two years of continuous losses, the hemp textile mill made a profit of 310600 yuan, which made us see light spots in the black hole." Lu Qiang said that after starting to reverse the decline, Yulin hemp textile mill purchased four sewing machines from Pingnan hemp textile mill in 1986 to enhance the production capacity of sewing edges. In those years, after the development of new products, ordering companies poured in, and the supply of products was once in short supply. Because of its outstanding performance, Yulin hemp textile mill won the enterprise acceptance certificate in December of that year, and was successively rated as "advanced unit of rectifying Party style", "advanced unit of Party construction" and "advanced unit of spiritual civilization construction" by autonomous region and our city.

In 1987, however, the sack market changed dramatically. "At that time, the economic benefits of planting sugarcane were better than jute, and many of the original jute growers changed to sugarcane." Lu Qiang said that this phenomenon has led to a substantial reduction of local jute raw materials, and factory production needs to purchase raw materials from other places, resulting in increased costs. In addition, the snake skin bag products appeared in the market at that time, and the hemp bag products were seriously impacted. In this way, sack production goes down the slope. In 1992, Yulin hemp textile factory officially stopped production, and a hemp textile enterprise that once enjoyed unlimited scenery ended its curtain.