Industrial Bank: Financial Spring Rain Nourishes the Fertile Land, Painting a New Picture of Rural Revitalization

Reprinted from: Economic Information Daily

As spring returns to the earth, everything is taking on new life “through cultivation.” From feed production workshops on the Northeast Plain to fishing-ports on the Jiaodong Peninsula, from intelligent greenhouses on the Yunnan–Guizhou Plateau to the agricultural-support experimental plots in Minning Town of Ningxia, and then to fishermen’s homestays along the East China Sea coast—vivid scenes of thriving industries, beautiful rural areas, and well-off farmers are gradually unfolding across vast rural lands.

Looking at “agriculture, rural areas, and farmers” in the opening year, the 2026 Central No. 1 Document points out that agricultural and rural modernization is related to the overall situation and the “finish” of Chinese-style modernization, and makes deployments around anchoring agricultural and rural modernization and solidly promoting comprehensive rural revitalization.

As a domestic bank of systemic importance, Industrial Bank (興业银行) deeply practices the political nature and people-centered nature of financial work, treating serving rural revitalization as a major political mission and a new strategic space for development. It leverages its distinctive strengths, continuously innovates products and services, and strengthens service teams to channel more financial liquidity into county-level economies and rural soil. As of the end of February 2026, Industrial Bank’s agricultural-related loans had increased by more than RMB 19 billion compared with the beginning of the year, with a growth rate of over 3.5%.

Strengthen full-chain financial support　Serve as the “keystone” for food security

During the spring plowing season, in the feed production workshop of Daqing Hefeng Animal Husbandry, machines roar as bag after bag of finished feed rapidly rolls off the line, ready to be shipped to livestock farms in surrounding counties and cities.

As a star local enterprise in agricultural industrialization, Hefeng Animal Husbandry links farmers on one end and the market on the other. It plays an important role in ensuring procurement of feed grain sources upstream and providing livestock supply downstream. With Heilongjiang’s animal husbandry sector accelerating its development, the company’s orders are growing; however, seasonal raw-material procurement requires large amounts of capital, and agricultural enterprises have limited collateral, making financing a challenge for the time being.

Industrial Bank’s Harbin branch investigates and matches needs in the front line of production. Within two weeks, it disbursed RMB 10 million in funds to help the company lock in high-quality grain sources and ensure continuity of production.

Leading enterprises in agricultural industrialization are a core force in building a modern agricultural industrial system, and an important bridge for helping small farmers integrate into modern agriculture. Industrial Bank takes leading enterprises in agricultural industrialization as an important starting point for serving rural revitalization. It supports enterprises in integrating the industrial chain, upgrading the value chain, and unblocking the supply chain, helping form a virtuous cycle of “around a single leading enterprise, establishing a production base, driving an entire county’s industrial development, and enabling farmers and residents to get rich in a coordinated way.”

In Rongcheng’s Shidao Port in February, the salty aroma of the catch is wrapped in sea breeze. In the seafood market, people and vehicles come and go; sorting, weighing, and loading onto trucks are all busy. Rongcheng has abundant marine resources, with complete business formats such as distant-water fishing, aquatic product processing, and cold-chain distribution. Fisheries are a major pillar industry there.

Based on local marine fisheries development characteristics, Industrial Bank provides differentiated support to leading enterprises, processing enterprises, and market merchants. During the 2026 Spring Festival, it successively issued loans totaling RMB 14 million to relevant enterprises. Cumulatively, it has provided loans of more than RMB 200 million to businesses within Rongcheng’s marine fisheries industrial chain—making financial services embedded even more deeply into key links such as fishing, processing, and trading.

“By continuously strengthening full-chain financial support in key areas of important agricultural product supply, such as grain production, livestock breeding, and fishery catch, we help ensure stable production and supply, and keep the bottom line for food security.” A relevant person in charge of Industrial Bank’s Rural Revitalization Department said. As of the end of February 2026, Industrial Bank’s loans in key food-related areas had increased by more than RMB 2 billion compared with the beginning of the year.

Driving county-level featured industries　Turn “local specialties” into a “big industry” that boosts income

Entering the modern greenhouse at Dali Chunmiyuan Agricultural Technology Co., Ltd., in eastern Zhejiang, you see colorful cherry tomatoes hanging full on the branches. With 8 colors, 10 major categories, and more than 200 individual products, this plateau greenhouse has strong distinctiveness.

In January 2026, Industrial Bank’s Dali branch granted a RMB 5 million credit loan to the company, earmarked specifically to support expanding planting and production. This loan carries multiple attributes, including inclusive finance, agricultural-related finance, technology finance, and green finance. It provides effective support for the company to develop modern facility agriculture and培育 new quality productive forces in agriculture.

With this loan support, the company has continuously expanded its planting scale. Its products cover 34 provinces (autonomous regions and municipalities) nationwide, and are also exported to Southeast Asian countries. As the industry continues to develop, local villagers have more opportunities to work near their homes. At present, the company has driven employment for more than 500 local villagers, with per-capita annual income gains of RMB 40k.

It is understood that Industrial Bank tailors its approach to local conditions and focuses on county-level featured industrial chains. It has innovated and built a proprietary service model of “One County, One Industry, One Policy,” using precise “targeted irrigation” of financial liquidity into rural fields, helping “one place, one product” form into linked chains and clustered industries. It turns “local specialties” into a “big industry,” injecting strong momentum into high-quality development of county-level economies.

In Gutian, Ningde—known as the “Capital of Edible Fungi in China”—the small mushrooms are what supports a “big industry” for increased income and prosperity for local people. From purchasing mushroom strains, to maintaining greenhouses, to production processing and sales distribution—every link in the industrial chain is related to the production and operations of mushroom growers, cooperatives, and mushroom enterprises.

To meet these needs, Industrial Bank’s Ningde branch launched two credit loan products: “Xingsu Loan (Gutian Mushroom Industry Exclusive)” and “Individual Business Loan (Edible Fungi Exclusive).” These are designed to serve the main entities across every link of the industrial chain in a convenient and efficient way. By the end of 2025, it had issued loans to 211 customers totaling RMB 382 million. Financial liquidity runs through the full chain from mushroom strain R&D, to planting and cultivation, to production processing and sales distribution, continuously polishing the “Gutian Tremella” brand gold signboard.

Since it launched the special action “Xing Hundred Counties, Flourish Hundred Industries, Benefit Thousand Enterprises” in August 2025, Industrial Bank has closely aligned with each locality’s county-level agricultural resource endowments. Through diversified, relay-style services, it promotes the “linking of beads into a chain” along the industrial chain, and helps featured agriculture develop toward scale, industrialization, and branding. To date, it has issued more than 110 county-level industrial project plans.

Deepen collaboration and assistance　Push financial services from “blood transfusion” to “blood-making”

Minning Town is an important window for Fujian–Ningxia cooperation. Over the years, capital, technology, and ideas from China’s southeast coastal areas have gathered here and taken root.

In 2018, an entrepreneur from Fuzhou came to Minning Town of Ningxia to invest in and establish an agricultural enterprise to develop radish cultivation. As the operating scale continued to expand, Industrial Bank’s Minning micro and small business branch provided a RMB 7 million loan to help the company stabilize production and expand operations.

It is worth noting that, around the company’s needs for transformation and upgrading, Industrial Bank also connected it to agricultural technology resources from enterprises founded by alumni of Xiamen University. This brought in patented fertilizer and planting technologies for the company, supporting the construction of “agricultural support experimental plots” in Minning Town. This promoted the company’s transition from ordinary planting to organic planting, raising yield per mu (0.067 hectares) by 15% and doubling its planting scale. The agricultural enterprise, founded by businessmen from Fujian in Ningxia, has also gradually developed more than 5,000 mu of planting bases. Its product sales channels have continued to broaden, and it has helped surrounding farmers achieve stable income growth.

From simply solving the problem of financing difficulty, to bringing in technology, channels, and resources together, the focus of financial services has kept extending. Today, Industrial Bank has more than 1,000 financial special envoys who have been going out to county-level front lines year-round. They go into workshops and factory premises, and delve into fields and village plots, providing comprehensive services of “financing + enabling business know-how” to nearly 1,000 enterprises. They measure needs with their footsteps, and interpret commitment with professional expertise.

In Zhaojue County of Liangshan in Sichuan, the “Cliff Village” was once widely known due to transportation constraints. Although special products such as high-mountain wushang potatoes and Yi embroidery have excellent quality, they were at one time constrained by accessibility and development foundations—good things could not be shipped out of the mountains, and tourists could not come in.

“Have resources, lack funds; have products, but no sales channels” has become a long-term reality faced by many operating entities in Zhaojue County. Local villagers guard good resources but struggle to convert them into tangible returns.

Industrial Bank’s Chengdu branch’s financial special envoys climbed up steel ladders again and again. In the daytime they visited farmers and assessed sites; at night, they and colleagues worked out plans. Targeting local pain points, they innovatively launched an integrated development model of “agricultural products + cultural tourism,” and issued project loans totaling RMB 170 million to Zhaojue County for the construction of the “Zhaojue Cliff Village Sky Valley Project.”

From bringing tourists in to making the industry come alive, the “Sky Valley” project is helping local resource advantages accelerate their transformation into development advantages. In 2025, the Cliff Village received more than 30k tourist visits, enabling employment for 120 households in three surrounding villages, with comprehensive income from projects exceeding RMB 10 million.

Activate new rural formats　Help more beautiful scenery accelerate conversion into good “money prospects”

Xiangshan, located on the eastern coast of Zhejiang, is surrounded by the sea on three sides and embraced by two ports. Mountains, sea, bays, islands, and beaches complement one another, and the look of fishermen’s villages and the charm of the harbor match each other. Relying on its unique marine resources and advantages in coastal tourism, the homestay economy has gradually become an important part of emerging rural formats.

As tourist numbers continue to rise year by year, coastal homestays have become one of the most vibrant featured industries in the local area. Considering the characteristics of the homestay economy—light assets and distinct peak and off seasons—Industrial Bank’s Ningbo branch launched “Homestay Loan,” supporting uses such as homestay renovations and operational turnover.

“After the old house was renovated, we had more guests. On holidays, it’s often hard to get a room.” After receiving the loan, Ms. Li, the owner of the Shipu homestay in Xiangshan, renovated an old house into a high-end homestay; more visitors followed, and operations have improved further. As of the end of February 2026, Industrial Bank had issued more than RMB 8 million in “Homestay Loan” funding in Xiangshan, providing loan support to 16 homestays in Xiangshan. It also enabled nearby employment for 112 villagers, and connected diversified formats such as direct sales of agricultural products and experiential services for fishery culture.

In recent years, as the rural revitalization strategy has been implemented more deeply, new rural industries and formats are growing faster. Homestays, cultural tourism, eco leisure and other formats continue to integrate, and more and more rural “sleeping resources” are being transformed into income-generating capital, injecting strong momentum into comprehensive rural revitalization. At the same time, it opens up broad new space for financial services.

As the birthplace of the “Two Mountains” philosophy, Yu Village in Anji County, Zhejiang, continues to explore green development and has followed a typical transformation path from “a mining village” to “an ecological village, a tourism village.” This village—once “the mountains turned bald and the water turned muddy” due to quarrying and operating a cement plant—has gradually embarked on a new road of prioritizing ecology and pursuing green development after the shutdown of mines, environmental remediation, and a transition in development approaches.

To support the project construction for creating the 5A scenic spots of Zhubo Garden and the Two Mountains in Yu Village in Anji County, Industrial Bank issued a syndicated loan of RMB 500 million. The funding provides support for upgrading and renovation of the scenic area, integrated management of the river basin, ecological restoration, and improvement of basic infrastructure—helping local areas better convert ecological advantages into development advantages. With the flourishing development of emerging formats such as homestays, camping, and coffee, the ecological undertone of the past is being continually transformed into new rural formats and new drivers for revitalization, further polishing Industrial Bank’s green finance brand card.

“My bank will closely focus on key tasks of comprehensive rural revitalization, promote product innovation, redirect funds, send talent to rural areas, and bring technology to the countryside. We will continuously explore rural revitalization financial service models that have distinctive features of Industrial Bank and are practical and effective, making greater contributions to promoting comprehensive rural revitalization and accelerating agricultural and rural modernization.” A relevant person in charge of Industrial Bank’s Rural Revitalization Department said. As of the end of 2025, Industrial Bank’s outstanding balance of agricultural-related loans exceeded RMB 550 billion.

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