In Yucheng County, Shangqiu City, Henan Province, a small steel tape measure started from a rural workshop and went nationwide and sold overseas, becoming a dazzling industrial business card in the high-quality development of the county economy.
However, this industry with an annual output value of 12 billion yuan was originally “purchased” from scraps.
In the 1980s, villagers in Shaogang Town, Yucheng County started by sorting discarded ruler strips from sorting manufacturers. They relied on their tenacity to assemble them by hand and sell them from village to house, and gradually “scoured” the steel tape measure industry.
After more than 40 years of development, today’s Yucheng County has gathered more than 2,000 steel tape measure companies, with an annual output of 1.5 billion steel tape measures. The products are exported to more than 120 countries and regions, accounting for 85% of the national market share and more than 65% of the global market share. It is known in the industry as “China’s Steel Tape City”.
The close linkage and efficient collaboration between upstream and downstream have enabled the rapid rise of the steel tape measure industry in Yucheng County.
“In the past, when we made accessories, we needed to purchase them from other places, which was time-consuming and expensive. Now we have formed an industrial cluster and built a local factory that can produce dozens of tons of raw materials a day.” Li Heng, deputy general manager of Shangqiu Jiate Metal Products Co., Ltd., said that more than a dozen surrounding companies can use it, and all the accessories of a steel tape measure can be equipped within a radius of 5 kilometers, which improves efficiency.
From discarded ruler strips to a tens of billions industry, the steel tape measure industry in Yucheng County is also seeking high-quality development. It is no longer satisfied with simple “measurement”, but is steadily moving towards “high precision” and “intelligent” directions.
Walking into the production workshop of Henan Xuanshi Tools Co., Ltd., workers are assembling steel tape measures in an orderly manner.
“We now have more than 40 patents and have launched a series of intelligent laser ranging products that integrate AI algorithms and Internet of Things technology.” Yang Yonghang, director of Henan Xuanshi Tools Co., Ltd., introduced that the company has also built an intelligent production base of 6,000 square meters, linked to more than 10 companies, and its products sell well in more than 40 countries and regions.
Yucheng County has built a hardware tool industry industrial park around the steel tape measure industry, and built a national steel tape measure and hardware tool quality supervision and inspection center (Henan). At the same time, it has linked up with universities to build training bases to provide technical talents for industrial upgrading.
From family workshops to industrial clusters, from manual assembly to large-scale production, Yucheng County is using this small steel tape measure to measure a new path for county development.
In the future, the steel tape measure industry in Yucheng County is expected to continue to move forward on the road of intelligence and high precision, injecting stronger impetus into the development of the county economy and contributing more to the global expansion of Chinese products.
