How do grain dryer companies stand out?

From 2015 to 2017, China's grain drying industry showed a “spurt-type” development. In the heyday of 2016, more than 400 companies entered. However, by 2018, the entire dryer industry suffered a cold wave, leaving less than 150 in the agricultural machinery subsidy system. Due to the lack of core competitiveness and specialization capabilities, it is expected that one-third of small and micro enterprises will withdraw from the market competition this year, and the drying industry will usher in a larger scale of resource integration and restructuring.

At the 2nd National Grain Drying Equipment Technology and Industry Development Summit held in Zhengzhou, Henan Province recently, the industry authority from the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, domestic universities, and the technical authority and business leaders of dryer production enterprises gathered together for China. Suggestions on the development of the grain drying industry.

Dilemma: weak foundation, overcapacity

Throughout the development of foreign grain drying machinery, the research of grain dryer started in the 1940s. In the 1950s and 1960s, developed countries basically realized the mechanization of grain drying. From the 1960s to the 1970s, grain drying was automated. In the 1980s, grain drying was developed in the direction of high efficiency, high quality, energy saving, cost reduction, and computer control. After the 1990s, grain drying equipment has reached serialization and standardization. In terms of possession, compared with more than 95% of the grain drying mechanization level in developed countries such as Europe and the United States, China's grain drying mechanization level is less than 10%, which is still the “short board” of mechanization in agriculture.

In recent years, the state finance has earmarked funds to subsidize farmers and large grain growers to purchase agricultural products such as grain dryers. Since 2011, drying equipment has been listed in the National Agricultural Machinery Subsidy Catalogue and has been heavily subsidized. In some places, such as Fujian, not only strict implementation of state subsidy standards, but also 15% subsidy for grain dryers, Zhejiang, Guangxi, Henan The provinces are also adding subsidies equal to the state subsidies, reaching a cumulative subsidy of 60%. The policy dividend has injected a "cardiotonic agent" into the development of China's grain drying industry.

The rapid development of the dryer industry and the rapid improvement of industrial technology, quality and brand have laid the industrial foundation for the high growth of the dryer product market. China's dryer industry has grown from scratch, from small to large, and has begun to take shape. The dryers produced in China have been greatly improved in terms of technology, performance and brand. However, behind the prosperity of the market, the crisis of overcapacity is also emerging.

According to statistics, the current ratio of dryer capacity to market demand is about 5:1. At present, the proportion of dryers with more than 800 sets of dryers in China is less than 4%, and the proportion of enterprises with annual output of less than 300 is as high as 80%. “The overall development of domestic grain dryer industry lacks planning. There is no self-owned brand enterprise with core* technology in the industry. The ability of product technology development and production of high-quality products is insufficient, the drying energy consumption is high, and the quality of food is poor after drying. The means are varied and the market lacks effective supervision," said Li Xiaohua, deputy general manager of Zoomlion Heavy Machinery Co., Ltd.

Guo Shanhui, general manager of COFCO Engineering Equipment Wuxi Co., Ltd. believes: “The lack of R&D innovation, completely copying and copying, blindly followers, can not have good products. Enterprise competition is ultimately the quality of competition, small enterprises can not compete with large enterprises in quality I have to use price levers to shake the market. The price war will lead to the elimination of enterprises without cost advantages. Enterprises will be dying, and they will cut corners and set consumption traps, which will make the whole industry credible. ""

Breaking the game: segmenting the target market and adapting to new demands

“In spite of the obvious growth trend of domestic dryers in recent years, the amount of grain dried by machinery only accounts for a fraction of the national grain output every year. The development of grain dryers in China is far from being able to adapt to the needs of grain production development. Liu Qing, deputy director of the Agricultural Products Processing Engineering Research Institute of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Planning, believes that with the acceleration of agricultural modernization and the development of agricultural product processing industry, the future development potential of grain dryers is huge.

"From the third agricultural census data, we can see that small farmers in China account for about 98% of the total number of farmers, which means that for a long time, the basic national conditions of 'big country small farmers' will not change, with the emergence of a large number of new agricultural management entities. The demand for grain drying is growing, but there is a difference in the demand for dryers in different regions and different subjects. Whether from the technical level or from the perspective of enterprises, segmentation of target markets is an inevitable requirement." Liu Qing said .

Different crops have different requirements for safe storage after harvest, and product diversification still needs to be improved. The demand for drying of rice, corn, wheat and other food crops is large, followed by economic crops such as soybeans, rapeseed and seeds, fruits and vegetables, and medicinal materials. Among them, rice accounts for about 35% of total grain production, and the moisture content in the south is more than 25%. The demand for safe storage is below 14%; corn accounts for 33.6% of total grain and 20%-24% of water. Storage requirements are below 14%. And many economic crops such as fungus, tobacco, tea, forage, fruits, vegetables, etc., have a lower water content for safe storage.

In terms of operational requirements, the requirements of different subjects are also different. Although the current harvesting machinery has been greatly improved, there are still impurities such as straw mixed, and it is necessary to perform an advanced screening sieve before drying. Liu Qing told reporters: "We found that many cooperatives hope that the dryers are equipped with cleaning and sorting functions." How can we clean and remove impurities, process intelligence, uniform drying, low operating cost, easy operation, and dryers for China The company has put forward higher requirements.

From the perspective of product form, the customer needs to develop from a single drying machine to a supporting drying equipment, to a drying and storage and transportation integrated drying project. "In the future, the agricultural machinery and equipment industry will no longer be a single purchase of products and services, but a purchase plan, which will provide farmers and agricultural production organizations with modern agricultural production solutions of different crops, different scales and different agricultural production models. Zoomlion has put forward the business strategy of 'agricultural production mechanization solution provider', and under the guidance of this strategy, adhere to the scientific and technological innovation of agricultural machinery, and achieved certain results." Li Xiaohua introduced, Zhonglian The auxiliary projects independently developed by Chongke include wet hoppers, wet barns, hoists, chain conveyors and other equipment. The purpose of providing a complete set of solutions is to make the user experience more convenient and economical.

In addition, the country's environmental protection requirements are increasing year by year. Energy-saving and environmentally-friendly drying equipment and heat sources will become the focus of users. Production enterprises should actively respond to national environmental protection requirements and develop environmentally-friendly products in a targeted manner to meet market demand. “The development trend of drying equipment is to give full play to the energy characteristics of different regions, such as the use of various joint heating methods, transplantation of heat pumps and heat pipe technology, development of solar-type grain dryers, etc. At the same time, the development of automatic control technology for grain dryers, In order to ensure the realization of * excellent operating conditions. With the emphasis on environmental protection, environmentally friendly grain dryers and heat sources will be the direction of future research." Guo Guixia, chief engineer of Zhengzhou Wangu Machinery Co., Ltd. said.

Goal: Large, brand, intelligent, environmentally efficient

Since 2018, the number of new installed users in the dryer industry has dropped sharply. Due to environmental protection and competitive pressure, many old users have begun to upgrade or upgrade their equipment. Through long-term use, these old users have become the drying aspect*, with strong brand awareness and quality awareness. At this stage, the underlying logic of the domestic dryer industry competition has undergone a complete change, and “brand + service” has become New competitive tools.

“From the perspective of long-term market feedback, users, especially large customers, are not the first factor when choosing a dryer. Manufacturers with good performance in the market and good service have become *. Influenced by the increasing demand of high-end customers. The main efforts of the national dryer enterprises are to emphasize technology, improve quality, foster brand awareness and enhance service awareness." Guo Shanhui said.

In large grain depots, grain post-harvest service centers, and large-scale projects with strong capital, foreign brands and domestic first-line brands have certain market advantages. With the further changes in the way of agricultural production and management in China, the scale of land is further concentrated, the drying capacity requirements are getting larger and larger, the degree of automation and environmental protection requirements are getting higher and higher, and the traditional small to medium tonnage can no longer meet the production requirements, and will be large, Environmentally friendly and intelligent dryers provide a broad space for development.

For the intelligent control of drying, China has made some progress and is constantly exploring. According to Zhu Wenxue, vice president of Henan University of Technology, the intelligent grain drying solution will further promote the organic integration of drying process and Internet technology, realize remote real-time data collection and control of grain drying process, realize unified management on site, build *, equipment manufacturers, User integrated work platform. Intelligently mine the data stored in the management platform, on the one hand, realize intelligent decision-making, realize intelligent control of grain drying equipment, and realize barrier-free communication between personnel and equipment, production enterprises and users, and provide production enterprises and users Decision basis.

In the future, drying equipment will be seamlessly integrated with the intelligent grain storage system. The intelligent, informational and digital construction of the grain depot is one of the supporting construction contents. Through the establishment of the information management platform of the reservoir area, the intelligentization of grain storage and storage, the automation of grain operations and the visualization of daily management are realized. Drying is the main means of grain storage and grain preservation. It is also an information node for intelligent construction. The drying system uses standard and open data interfaces to seamlessly interface with the upper management platform to achieve drying operation scheduling and equipment management. Management functions such as energy efficiency analysis and team assessment. In addition, data such as drying process control, equipment operation status, parameter setting monitoring, and energy consumption can also directly share data and interconnect, and solve the problem of “information island” in the construction of information management of grain storage.

Overall, in 2019, the industry will be deeply shuffled, and companies with strong comprehensive strength and professional ability will cross the “thorn bush” to obtain more orders and quality customers. With the development of the industry increasingly standardized, the market demand is more and more rational, large-scale, intelligent, branded, environmentally friendly and efficient grain dryer is bound to be the direction of future efforts.

The stable and healthy development of the grain dryer industry is a key link to solve the problem of “one kilometer after the grain production” and is an important guarantee for China's food security. The development of China's grain drying equipment industry is still in a non-standard development stage. The road ahead is full of thorns and challenges, recognize the status quo and prospects of China's grain drying industry, and rely on the joint efforts of enterprises, markets and governments to make grain dryers. The industry is moving towards a healthy and healthy development track.