Shanxi Dongfangliang Life Technology Co., Ltd. is located in Guangling County, which lies in the southeast of Datong, Shanxi province, China. The company engages in food research and development, food sales and processing, and grain purchase; meanwhile, her main business also covers processing and marketing grains and other primary agricultural products, including soy products and processed food products. Also, the company has already begun her business in the international market. At present, she has extended her business into IT industry and consultancy industry, and has become a qualified supplier of computers, computer-related products and information-system integration services.           

　　The firm and her people believe that integrity founds the brand and quality helps to win the market. The company has been basing her further development on the abundant upstream agricultural resources and focused on the market of coarse cereals, giving priority on the Dongfangliang(Oriental Brightness) millet. The sales of the Dongfangliang(Oriental Brightness) millet, red kidney beans and other crops have improved steadily. Since these products were launched in the market, they have enjoyed widespread popularity among the consumers. Among these products, the "Dongfangliang(Oriental Brightness)" millet products have passed a series of authentication, such as QS certification, green food certification, organic product certification, HACCP certification and so on.

　　"Dongfangliang(Oriental Brightness)" millet is one of the brand-name products in Shanxi .It was supplied to the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games as exclusive millet product. Moreover, it has become one of the specially-supplied food materials for the two national conferences: National People’s Congress(NPC) and the Chinese People’s Political Consultation Congress(CPPCC) since 2007, and it won the Gold Prize of the seventh, the ninth and eleventh China International Agricultural Products Trade Fair.

　　Through integrating the upstream and downstream resources and taking the hi-tech and original eco-industrial route, the company will develop agricultural resources deeply and sustainably and implement the plan to diversify agricultural products. And now she is on the way to establish a firm and modern team with core products and core competitiveness, thereby making bigger and stronger the small grains industry of Shanxi.

　　“Dongfangliang(Oriental Brightness)”, the Company, has been adhering to the core values: “to undertake responsibility, to create value, to outdo ourselves and to share growth" , and devoting herself to expanding the cooperation in the domestic and international market so as to achieve the common vision for the better development. 

The History of “Dongfangliang(Oriental Brightness)”

　　There is a county in the northeast of Jin State(today it is named Shanxi Province), which is called “Guangling”.  The Mount Heng (Heng in Chinese means ‘eternal’) is located on its south.In the north of the mountains, the woods lush and prosper, with anima and lucky spirits. Among the mountain rangs are two mountains, the left one is called Caoduo(stack) Mountain, and the right one Tianlong (Heaven Drangon) Mountain. The shallow valley between these two mountains directs straight to the north, so it is named “Zhiyu (Straight Valley)” . There is a cold and crystal-clear spring gushing in the valley, named the Holy Spring.

　　A vast green pool comes into being as the spring flows under the earth, then pours out at the low-lying land in the southern part of the county. The water in the pool feels warm, soft and silky in winter, while chill, crystal-clear in summer. An ancient sage built a shrine in the pool to worship and offer sacrifices to the Water God, and the building was then given a decent name “Xiao Fang Hu” ( “Small Square Kettle”), while the neighbourhood has been calling it “ Shui Shen Tang” ( Hall for Worshiping Water God), which is now well-known in the northern Shanxi Province as a scenic spot.

　　“White grain” grows on the special ground, on the south slope of Shuishentang and the table land of each side of the valley “Zhi Yu” . Dusters of grain ears make a white territory. The rice of “white grain”looks very glorious in soft yellow, tasts and smells fairly wonderful. It has proved that this kind of rice used to be paid as tribute to the royal family in the hundreds of years after Ming Xuan Emperor of Ming Dynasty, and is populous throughout the history. It is even famous as“gold rice”.

　　In the Ming dynasty, because the founding emperor started in humble, at the just beginning of the establishment, that “clothes shouldn’t be fine and meals shouldn’t be abundant” was stipulated as the standard in the palace. After Emperor Cheng moved the capital to the North, the food for the royal family and the palace was mostly cooked with coarse cereals growing in the north, thereby demostrating the original meaning of the saying: “the Yellow Emperor (the Ancester of Chinese people) began parboiling grains for the meal".

　　In Xuande Years (1426-1436), Wang Shangwen, a Guangling native, got the leading position of the Revenue Department, he selected the “white grain” of his hometown and contributed the grain to the emperor. After tasting the cooked millet rice, the emperor was fairly satisfied with it. At that time, the imperial physicians told the emperor a story to prove the value of the millet, citing what was narrated in Shiji (a very classical history book on early Chinese history): “the marquis Yangxu was ill, and Chunyu Yi, a very skilled doctor, came to see him. After he examined him, he told Zhao Zhang that he would die of the fatal disease in five days. But, the marquis died on the seventh day. When he was asked for the reason, Chunyu YI said, ‘ he was keen on porridge cooked with millet, so he could be alive two more days’.” From then on, the millet produced in Guangling became the tribute to the king. And later, it spread to the officials in the capital and got a beautiful fame in the whole country gradually.      

　　But how did the millet obtain the name “Dongfangliang(Oriental Brightness)” ? There exist many lengends, among which the story related to Kangxi Emperor is spread most widely. It is said that Kangxi Emperor toured to Mount Wutai in autumn, by way of Guangling, where he made an inspection to the farmland at Dongfu in the early morning. After he came back from outside, he caught a cold and coughed slightly. One chamberlain served the porridge cooked with “white grain” rice urgently. The emperor recovered immediately, after he ate the porridge. Then he wrote a poem with pleasure: 

Tilling northern farmers are

by a river in the East a land high,

women are cooking and children are eating

the meal cooked in the busket light,

while it is getting bright.

gliding the abundant gold millet,

in the Yan and Zhao’s land behind,

commiserate the farmers for flight,

till it is brightening the cart freight.

　　The chamberlains were so clever that they smelled something from the emperor’s poet, so the name of “Dongfangliang(Oriental Brightness)” came into being. Moreover, someone went to Straight Valley by himself proving that the land and water are special and the temperature difference between day and night is very big, and all of these are the natual advantages for the grains growing there.

　　Since then, the “Dongfangliang(Oriental Brightness)” millet has begun to be honored as imperial grain rice.

　　After the establishment of the P.R.C. a ploughing village official, (this time the giver of the millet is not a high official any more), name Liu Qing, (who is the Party branch secretary of Village Nanfang in Zhiyubian) won the national labor medal in 1957 (a top national prize for labor). He was received by the Chairman Mao when he was invited to the conference in Beijing. Before he was to go to Beijing, he felt extremely honored and a strange idea occurred to him, he would bring a bag of  “Dongfangliang(Oriental Brightness)” millet to Chairman Mao.

　　The conference staff were touched by his simple sincerity, and the name of the millet, “ Dongfangliang(Oriental Brightness)”, was very similar to the name of the popular revolutionary song “Oriental sunrise” glorifying the leader, Chairman Mao. Then this bag of “Dongfangliang(Oriental Brightness)” millet was finally sent into Zhongnanhai. The leaders who lived in Zhongnanhai had not tasted any millet more than adecade since 1945, when they moved into Beijing after China had won the anti-Japanese War.

　　They all enjoyed the millet very much while tasting and highly appreciated it.

16 years later, Premier Zhou Enlai accompanied French President Georges Pompidou to Datong, they stayed at the Datong Hotel. When having the porridge during the night snack, he mentioned the “Dongfangliang(Oriental Brightness)” millet and said Chairman Mao once sent him some “Dongfangliang(Oriental Brightness)” millet to cook porridge. The words expressed some subtle feelings, liking, appreciation, …and the scene reminded himself of the past.

　　So far, these two real stories have been told from mouth to mouth with general approval among the people on the north of Yanmen Pass.