As Zhuang Lun said earlier, hops, especially American hops, have a very complete intellectual property protection mechanism.

It takes at least a dozen or even decades to develop a new hop plant before a commercial product comes out. These products usually have intellectual property rights and registered trademarks, and others are not allowed to use them casually.

Americans like to talk about intellectual property because they have an absolute advantage.

Of course, if a domestic hop company wants to introduce a certain variety, it is not impossible, but first you need to pay a large license fee.

However, it takes at least three years for a hop plant to go from seedling to yield, and if the license fee is paid, the production cost of the hop planting company will increase sharply, and at the same time, it will also need to bear greater risks, such as imported varieties grown in China are not suitable for water and soil, and cannot meet the expected quality and customer requirements.

Therefore, without the guarantee of orders from large wineries, basically no hop company dares to try it easily.

As for the new varieties developed by himself in China, Zhuang Lun has never thought about this aspect at all.

It often takes more than ten years to cultivate new varieties. In China, without the guidance of national agricultural and scientific research institutions, it is difficult for hop planting companies to develop new types of hops with market competitiveness only by virtue of their own capabilities.

Qi Zheng's "......" that "developed" new varieties by himself

In fact, some folk enthusiasts who are interested in hops are also trying to grow their own hops.

But in the eyes of professionals, it is certainly okay to entertain oneself, but this kind of interest cannot meet the requirements of commercial production.

Because the cultivation of hops is not as simple as raising potted plants at home. It has high requirements for soil and climatic conditions such as soil quality, rain, light, etc., and although it is possible to grow flowers, its composition is difficult to meet the requirements.

But someone is hanging.

"Nine Turns Nirvana Array, the main wood and earth system, the effect is mutagenic, and heterogeneous. Able to fight the mission, chaos is born. ”

A spirit circle for mutagenic species.

Over the past period of time, Qi Zheng has slowly figured out the key to this spirit array, and the power of the inducement has increased a lot.

To put it simply, it is necessary to create the worst environment for the creatures in the array, and then forcibly mutagenesis through the spirit array, the probability of obtaining heritable mutated creatures will be greatly increased.

The so-called "heaven will descend on the people, and they must first suffer their minds and work their muscles and bones......"

Take hops, for example.

Qi Zheng wanted to mutagenesize hops with a citrus flavor, so he directly planted hops in the most barren soil, used a certain amount of treated citrus peel as fertilizer, and poured water mixed with citrus peel oil, and then forcibly spawned by the "Nine Turns Nirvana Array" to grow and develop at a speed visible to the naked eye.

Of course, this completely unscientific way of cultivation ends in the death of hops in 95% of the time.

And even in the five percent of successful mutagenesis, the result is not necessarily hops with citrus aromas.

Maybe it's getting an orange hop, or a sour, bitter hop, or a complete mutation and getting an unknown hop......

However, because the launch of the "Nine Turns Nirvana Array" will inevitably give rise to mutagenesis, in scientific terms, it is probably that the cell division cycle is greatly shortened and the probability of natural gene mutation is greatly increased.

The growth cycle is short, and if it doesn't work once, it will mutagenesis a few more times, as long as you can be willing to spend time, your luck is not bad to the extent that you are angry, and there is a high probability that you can get a new variety that meets your wishes.

Qi Zheng's luck is not too bad, he secretly mutagenesis more than 300 times in the last half a year, and finally got three very good new varieties of hops that meet the requirements.

Don't look at the low success rate, this is already a big luck.

The new varieties that others often take more than ten years to cultivate, Qi Zheng only took half a year to achieve results. When it got out, it was mostly hop companies crying and shouting to hug their thighs.

But there is no need to explain these to Zhuang Lun.

Therefore, Qi Zheng said vaguely, "Well, you know, we can get some help through foreign relations, not to be introduced, it is our self-developed varieties, the specific source is difficult to say......"

Zhuang Lun's eyes lit up, "I understand!

You really don't understand!

Looking at his tacit smile, Qi Zheng was sure that he had made up his brain for plots such as commercial espionage and concealment......

Misunderstanding is misunderstanding, maybe it's more common sense to think like this, Qi Zheng comforted himself.

"Now we have three new varieties of hops in our company. One is earthy with citrus aromas and tastes, one with a pronounced woody aroma with a balance of oils and fats and rich in polyphenols, and the last one is bitter and excellent hops, with smooth and smooth flavors, mixed with pine, green tea and other aromas, which can be used to brew different styles of beers. Qi Zheng introduced.

Zhuang Lun is now just planting a single bitter type "Qingdao Big Flower", listening to these new varieties, saliva is going to flow.

"You have always been one of our hop suppliers of Qingyuan Beer, this time we still want to cooperate with you, I wonder what you think?"

Large-scale hop cultivation and management requires professionals, and as far as Qi Zheng knows, Zhuang Lun is one of the most experienced among local hop growers, and the hops produced on his plantation are often of higher quality than others.

"That's a good dare, I just don't know how you want to cooperate?" Zhuang Lun said without hesitation.

For hop growers, making a profit is the most basic need.

Previously, he was at a disadvantage in competition with imported hops because of his single variety. Because consumers often like to choose some new and advantageous new varieties. If there are no high-quality varieties to compete with foreign countries, the economic value of the hop products grown is really not high.

He also has to support his family, and if the income is not high, it is really better to grow other cash crops.

But with the support of the brewers, everything is different......

"We can invest in your plantation, both with capital and new varieties. At the same time, the brewery and the plantation have long-term contracts, but they are not allowed to sell to other manufacturers if the hops do not fully meet our needs. Also, hop varieties can't spread at will......"

Because hops is a long-term planting investment, it is difficult to reflect the benefits of short-term planting.

Qi Zheng had no intention of investing too much energy in the plantation, as long as he could own a certain stake in the plantation and ensure that his distillery could get the best quality hops......

"I agree!" Zhuang Lun also did not drag the mud and water.

It's good to enjoy the shade with your back against a big tree.

Hops are multi-year crops, planted at once, and can theoretically be harvested for 20 years in a row.

In other words, the initial cost can be spread over the next 20 years. If you give up after only planting for a few years, the upfront investment cost will be high to spread over each year.

There are beer manufacturers to help share the cost and produce orders for a long time, and he can't laugh, how can he object?

What's more, people also invested real money, and he didn't mind giving up some of his shares at all.

Both sides were interested, and after Zhuang Lun confirmed the authenticity of the new variety in Qi Zheng's hands, the cooperation was quickly reached.

In the name of Qingyuan Beer, Qi Zheng acquired the shares of Plantation 30 and signed a contract for the purchase of products.

After that, Zhuang Lun was busy expanding the scale of the hop plantation and arranging for people to plant new hops...... This year, it is expected to plant 6,000 acres, and adopt mechanized planting to reduce comprehensive production costs.

Qi Zheng was ready to leave after planting a spirit array in the new plantation to slowly improve the quality of the hops.

Also in Su Province, there is another major raw material for brewing - barley, which needs to be laid out......