The Qinggang broom stand at a trade fair.	A broom crafter.	Boundless fireweed fields.

Truly on-the-ball economic innovators spot the lucrative potential of everyday, household equipment as mundane as the humble broom. A case in point is Qinggang County, Heilongjiang Province in China’s northeast.

Qinggang is a one-hour drive from the provincial capital Harbin. It grows huge expanses of fireweed (Kochia scoparia), which is perfect for hand crafting brooms. Xinghua Town in Qinggang County has been crafting and selling brooms since its establishment in 1853. At one time local fireweed fields exceeded 10,000 mu (around 667 hectares). About 80 percent of the fireweed harvest, crafted into brooms, is freighted to regions as distant as Guangxi and Fujian provinces at the opposite end of China. The Xinghua broom featured annually in the Canton Commercial Fairs of the 1970s, but despite eliciting a warm response, did not flourish.

There has been a growing demand for the Qinggang broom -- this 100 percent organic, pollutant-free tastefully designed household item. It is now generally considered an item of décor as well as cleaning equipment, which justifies this classy sweeper’s higher-than-average price.

In order to forge a scale advantage, the county has implemented various fireweed growing and broom making incentives, such as loan support and market exploration, that have effectively mobilized local farmers. The sector welcomed its helmsman in 2006, when the Liaokuo Kongjian Broom Co. was established in Xinghua Town. The company later registered its Saotianxia (sweeping the world) brand with the Trademark Office of the State Administration for Industry and Commerce.

Since its foundation, Saotianxia has invested lavishly in introducing new fireweed species, employing technicians to give free training to growers and processors, and financing local farmer courses in advanced techniques outside of the region. The company has also revamped the broom design, transforming it from a mundane household tool to a refined, conversation-piece ornament.

Saotianxia products have caught the eye of domestic and international buyers at various trade events, such as the Harbin International Fair for Trade and Economic Cooperation, the Canton Fair and the Manzhouli Expo of Agricultural Products. The brooms are purchased by at least a dozen Chinese provinces, as well as being exported to countries and regions such as Russia, Japan and the ROK.

The Saotianxia brand, which has an annual production capacity of five million, combines traditional handicraft procedures with modern manufacturing techniques.

Li briskly weaves slender, pliant olive-green twigs in the Saotianxia workshop. Since the training sessions that helped her become proficient at broom-crafting her earnings have substantively increased. She can make a fancily fashioned broom that sells for RMB 68 at the Manzhouli Fair over the space of time it takes to have a leisurely chat. Li’s husband also works at the company’s home equipment section. Since the couple began to earns as much as RMB 100 daily, they have seriously considering asking their daughter, currently doing casual work in the city, to come home. The jobs she finds are no better paid than the broom-crafting her parents do on home ground.

In an aim to escalate the broom industry from dispersive to intensive-mode, Qinggang County plans to establish an industrial park center in its Xinghua Town. The county also intends expanding local fireweed fields by 20,000 mu (more than 1,300 hectares) by 2008, and cultivating 60,000 mu (4,000 hectares) by 2010.

Qinggang’s current one-million-broom output earns local farmers more than RMB 5 million annually. But the ultimate significance of this economic perk -- to locals and others - is that if money this good can be made from a weed, what other humble raw material awaits lucrative exploitation in this market economy age?