(Singapore, May 19, 2025)Amid rising global tensions over U.S.-China trade disputes and food security, the world is urgently seeking new approaches to economics and agriculture. Expanding food variety and enriching human diets now feature as popular ventures in global industrial sector. Within this trend, the sweet potato—once viewed as a “poor man’s food”—is undergoing a remarkable makeover. In China, it is now recognized as a staple food and hailed as the “gold among coarse grains,” steadily making forays into the health food market with significant industrial potential. In May/June 2025, the latest issue of Fortune Times, it shares the inspiring sights of agricultural technology through the cover story of Liang Chengwang, founder of Zixin Group.
- Liang engaged in traditional agriculture, where he built a comprehensive industrial chain spanning cultivation, product storage, R&D, manufacturing, sales and resource recycling;
- He successfully developed a “Sweet Potato Model” in Liancheng, Fujian which serves as a replicable formula to facilitate rural upliftment in China;
- Company listed in Singapore, the world’s one and only with sweet potatoes as its core business that is publicly traded;
This transformation of the sweet potato mirrors the entrepreneurial journey of Liang Chengwang, founder of Zixin Group, who has spent over 20 years developing the root vegetable into an industry. Born in Changting, Fujian, China, Liang established Zixin sweet potato company in 2009. Starting with sweet potato processing, he expanded the business to include sprout cultivation, fresh produce sales, bioproduct development, and a comprehensive ecosystem of agricultural technology. He elevated the humble sweet potato to a new status on Chinese dining tables while creating a modern agricultural model integrating industrial production, branding, and technology.
While China incorporates sweet potatoes into its national food security strategy, the country is reaching a critical juncture in uplifting its agriculture and related industrial restructuring. Leveraging his practical experience and strategic plannings, Liang now stands at the forefront of this historic transformation. Under his visionary leadership, Zixin is not just an agricultural company—it has become a crucial link between public food needs and agricultural innovation.
Headquartered in Liancheng, one of China’s major sweet potato-producing hubs, Zixin Group adopts a “biotechnology + circulation economy” model centred around sweet potatoes. It has developed a complete industrial chain spanning cultivation, product storage, R&D, manufacturing, sales, and resource recycling, achieving a closed-loop ecosystem stretching from cultivation to dining tables and from production to consumption. In early 2025, the company launched a variety of animal feed made from fermented probiotic sweet potato peel as well as an assortment of sweet potato-based snacks, all of which have secured their first batch of orders.
The “Sweet Potato Model” led by Liang is a replicable model for rural economies. It has already proven to work effectively in Liancheng and has been successfully extended to a rural upliftment project in Lingao County, Hainan Province, which covers 20,000 acres. Looking ahead, Liang envisions developing 1 million acres of sweet potato farmland in China over the next decade, with 30 agricultural demonstration parks and 100 sweet potato storage centres in major cities to boot, which would help enhance national food reserves and advance smart agriculture.
Zixin Group has been listed on the Singapore Exchange (SGX: 42W) since 2016. It is not only one of the few Chinese agricultural firms thriving in Singapore’s capital market but also the world’s only publicly traded company focused solely on sweet potatoes. With its dual identity—rooted in Fujian, China, and oriented toward international capital—Zixin serves as a vital bridge linking Chinese agricultural innovation with global investors. For investors, betting on Zixin is more than backing a food company; it’s a vote of confidence in the modernization of Chinese agriculture and the future of agri-biotech.
Zixin’s processed food products have obtained Halal certification in Indonesia and USDA organic food certification, laying a strong foundation for global market expansion. As the world increasingly seeks sustainable, safe, and nutritious agricultural solutions, Zixin is responding with a low-carbon, high-value-added ecosystem built around sweet potatoes which meets the new global trends in food and health.
Since its founding in 2004, Fortune Times has featured only entrepreneurs with exceptional leadership and industrial influence on its cover. In the ever-shifting landscape of business, Liang Chengwang chose to take on traditional agriculture, which is once considered an unfavoured sector. With sharp insight and unwavering dedication, he has continuously innovated in the sweet potato industry, blazing a new path of maximizing the value of agricultural product, applying advanced technology to supply chain, and elevating brand appeal to a global scale.
About Zixin Group
Zixin Group Holdings (SGX: 42W) is a China-based agricultural tech enterprise listed in Singapore. Founded in 2009, it focuses on sweet potato cultivation and marketing, with its main agricultural base located in Liancheng, Fujian Province. The company also develops sweet potato-based functional and snack foods, and converts sweet potato residues into animal feed. In the first half of 2025, Zixin’s fresh sweet potato sales reached 57 million RMB, a 107% increase year-over-year.
