OREANDA-NEWS. July 23, 2014. Citibank (China) Co. Ltd. ("Citi China") and Beijing Fuping Development Institute ("FDI") today jointly announced five-year achievements from their Rural Green Microenterprise Incubator Institute Program ("the Program") and published white paper titled "Green Microenterprise and Community Development Model" ("the Report").

The Program aims to provide safe agricultural produce, and calls for cooperation on eco-trust agriculture practice, soil conservation and environment protection so as to improve trust between farmers and consumers. Supported by Citi Foundation, it was launched in 2009 by the Beijing Fuping Development Institute in cooperation with Dachi Company of Japan, an eco-agricultural product marketing and sales platform. Over the past five years, the Program has trained household and small enterprises on systematic and eco-farming methods and built their capacities, benefiting 80 community leaders, 8,200 rural household microenterprises (about 32,800 individuals) and 42 small rural cooperatives in 8 provinces. The average household now receives 10 to 15 percent more income annually, generating a "triple bottom-line" – economic, environmental and social benefits.

Hongjun Teng, Executive Vice President of Citi China, said, "Citi is committed to be a responsible corporate citizen and we have always been looking for ways to support sustainable development of the local community. Today, we are delighted to share the accomplishments of the five-year Program, and we hope our experience and learnings can benefit more low-income farmer households and small enterprises, as well as advance the eco-trust agriculture model in China."

Along with this announcement, the FDI, supported by Tianjin Agricultural Institute Information Research Center, has published a white paper to highlight the valuable practices and criteria on China's sustainable and green rural sector. Being first of its kind in China, the Report is meant to provide to the sector a measurable agricultural mechanism composed of the whole agricultural production process.

Jaff Shen, President of FDI, shared, "A lot of domestic and international NGOs have been exploring ways to alleviate rural poverty while preserving the environment in China. Unfortunately, they have met with little success given the significant differences between rural areas in the country. Thanks to the generous support from Citi Foundation and Citi, the Program enabled us to develop an effective model which we can replicate in new rural areas we work with. This way, we can support existing and new microenterprises and interested farmers by linking them with markets, thereby increasing their income sustainably, and help them adopt eco-farming, animal and husbandry practices.

The Program was established in two bases –Tianjin and Sichuan. It identified and incubated green microenterprises and rural community leaders, provided them with a full range of eco-production related services, from eco-standard training, on-field local expert consulting, product package training and logistic service, as well as an eco-trust product market platform. Thereafter, the well-trained community leaders delivered trainings to individuals and microenterprises. In parallel, local agricultural experts and leading farmer representatives helped participants with individualized field monitoring, pest and disease responsive solutions, and developed the field monitoring system for quality control.