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From lotus field to sealed cartonEvery step of Xiangtan pearl lotus, documented

We connect global buyers with GAP-certified pearl lotus factories in Xiangtan, Hunan — the origin of China's tribute lotus. This page shows how the product you buy is actually grown, processed, graded, tested and packed, using photographs from the base and the plant, and the parameters used on the line.

Request a quote & samples See the 13 steps

Xiangtan, HunanOrigin · GI-protected Xiang lotus

Cunsanlian 寸三莲Variety · seed-rhizome base

GAP baseHuilongqiao, Paidou township

500 kgMOQ · FOB / CIF

Part A · In the field

Why the field decides the product

Pearl lotus is a starch ingredient — over half its dry weight. Whatever happens after harvest, drilling or polishing cannot repair a seed that was grown thin, harvested early or dried badly. So the process starts two seasons before your container is loaded.

Plant entrance of Hunan Lianmei Food, provincial leading enterprise, Xiangtan

Hunan Lianmei Food, Xiangtan — provincial leading enterprise in agricultural industrialisation

The base, and the seed we plant

基地与品种 · 湘潭寸三莲

Fields sit in the Xiang River basin at Huilongqiao village, Paidou township, Xiangtan county — low-lying paddy with the fine silt lotus rhizomes feed on. We plant Cunsanlian (寸三莲) from a dedicated seed-rhizome base: the tribute variety, named for a seed roughly one cun long.

In a 1985 comparative assay by the Wuhan commodity inspection authority, Xiangtan Cunsanlian was tested against three other lotus varieties on ten indicators and led on seven — sugar, starch, protein, fat, phosphorus, calcium and crude fibre.

Silt layer 15–20 cm
Seed rhizome 40–45 kg/mu
Terminal bud intact, 2–3 nodes
Led on 7 of 10 indicators (1985)

Farmers planting lotus rhizomes at fixed spacing in a flooded paddy field at the Xiangtan base

Rhizomes set at fixed spacing in the flooded field — Xiangtan base, spring planting

Field preparation and planting

整地与定植

Basal fertiliser goes down before planting, then rhizomes are set at a fixed spacing with the terminal bud oriented toward the field centre so the creeping rhizome does not run into the bund. Outer rows are planted denser to leave spares for gap filling.

Green manure 2,000 kg/mu
Farmyard manure 1,000–1,500 kg/mu
Compound fertiliser 50–80 kg/mu
20–30 holes/mu · 3–4 rhizomes each
Spacing 6–7 m × 3–5 m

Water depth through the season

Seedling3–7 cm

May–June8–12 cm

Mid-June12–16 cm

Jul–Aug15–25 cm

Wintermoist

Water layer and rhizome care

水层管理与调鞭

Water depth is the main lever on yield and seed fill. It is stepped up through the season and held deep through the July–August heat, which is also when the plant flowers and sets seed.

From late May the rhizome is re-oriented every 4–7 days on sunny afternoons, so new growth spreads evenly instead of crowding one corner of the field. Old, blackened and over-dense leaves are stripped so the canopy stays open.

Re-orient every 4–7 days
Sunny afternoons only
Dense canopy thinned

Farmer hand-picking green lotus seed pods at 8-9 maturity in a Hunan lotus field

Hand-picking pods at 8–9 maturity — seed firm and starchy, pericarp still green

Harvest at 8–9 maturity

采收

Pods are picked by hand at 8–9 maturity. Picked early the seed stays hollow and light; picked late the skin stains and the plumule turns bitter. Pods leave the field the same day for the plant, so the seed never sits in the heat.

Hand-picked
8–9 maturity
Same-day transfer to plant
GAP harvest records kept

Part B · Primary processing

Shell, drill, grind, split

Three mechanical operations turn a harvested seed into an export grade. The order matters: the core is drilled before grinding, because the plumule is what turns a white lotus bitter.

Processing and packing building at the Xiangtan plant

Processing and packing building, Xiangtan plant

Threshing and shelling

脱粒 · 脱壳

Seeds are threshed from the pod, then the hard outer shell is cracked and lifted off mechanically. An impurity-removal pass follows immediately — husk fragments, undersized seed and field debris are pulled out before anything reaches the drilling line.

Mechanical shelling
Impurity removal pass
No chemical softening

Coreless drilled white pearl lotus seeds, holes clean through

Coreless (drilled) grade — plumule removed, not disguised

Core drilling

通芯

The bitter lotus plumule is drilled out on automated lines rather than by hand. This is the operation buyers ask about most, because leftover plumule is what makes a lotus paste turn bitter after cooking — and because hand drilling cannot hold a consistent rate across a 25 kg bag.

99.9% core-removal rate
Automated drilling lines
Clean bore, no residual core

Polished white grade — whiteness from grinding, not bleaching

Grinding, polishing and splitting

磨皮 · 抛光 · 开边

Surface grinding takes off the thin brown skin left after shelling; polishing brings up the white. For the split grade the seed is opened along its natural seam. Nothing here is bleached — whiteness comes from removing the skin, not from treating it.

No sulphur bleaching
Split along the natural seam
Four separate grades

Part C · Grading and quality control

What we check, and what you get in writing

Grading is by caliper, not by eye. Colour sorting handles the volume; a hand-pick line handles what a camera cannot judge. Every lot can ship with a certificate of analysis.

Caliper measuring a Cunsanlian lotus seed against the grade specification

Caliper grading — Grade 1 measured at 12.5 mm and above

Caliper grading

卡尺分级

Seeds are sized with a caliper into export grades, so a bag matches the specification you contracted rather than the average of the day's output. Grade 1 is 12.5 mm and above.

Grade 1 ≥ 12.5 mm
Caliper, not eye
Grade stated on the COA

Round whole grade after colour sorting and hand picking

Colour sorting and hand picking

色选 · 人工挑选

Optical sorters reject off-colour, stained and foreign material at line speed. Behind them a hand-pick line removes broken seed, residual skin and uneven grains — the defects a sorter cannot see, such as a seed that is chalky inside but white outside.

Optical colour sorting
Hand-pick on every batch
Broken / chalky seed rejected

Warehouse thermo-hygrometer reading 23 degrees Celsius and 62 percent relative humidity

Finished-goods warehouse: 23 °C, 62% RH — read off the wall instrument

Drying and climate control

烘干 · 仓储环境

Drying runs to the moisture figure agreed in the contract — commonly 13% or below for container shipment, because a seed that leaves at 15% will sweat inside a carton crossing the equator. Finished goods are then held under monitored temperature and humidity; the reading above is the actual warehouse condition.

Moisture to contract spec
Commonly ≤ 13%
Warehouse 23 °C / 62% RH

Per-batch test panel

MoistureContracted figure, commonly ≤13%

Aflatoxin B1Mycotoxin, the main rejection risk in transit

Pesticide residuesMulti-residue screen

Sulphur dioxideConfirms no sulphur bleaching

Soil at the GAP base is tested independently (SGS panel: heavy metals, organochlorine residues). Certificates are on the authority page.

Laboratory testing

检测 · 每批报告

Each batch is tested for moisture, aflatoxin B1, pesticide residues and sulphur dioxide, and a certificate of analysis can be issued with the shipment — the sheet your QA team files against the purchase order.

If your market needs a specific limit — EU maximum levels, a Codex-aligned spec, or your own incoming-QC sheet — state it at inquiry stage and the spec is written into the contract and the COA.

COA per lot
Customer spec accepted
Third-party lab on request

Round whole珍珠莲 · 圆粒

Coreless (drilled)通芯莲

Split / open开边莲

Grinding / polished磨白莲

Grades are not cosmetic. A mooncake-paste plant wants coreless and a uniform particle after cooking; a soup or dessert packer often wants whole round; a flour or beverage line wants polished white with a low defect count. Tell us the application and we quote the grade that fits it — specifications per grade.

Part D · Packing, storage and loading

The last mile is where good seed is lost

Moisture pick-up, compression and condensation in transit cause more claims on lotus seed than the processing line ever does. Packing and loading are treated as production steps, not logistics.

Finished goods warehouse with stacked 25 kg lotus seed bags

Finished goods, stacked bag-on-bag in the monitored warehouse

Packing

包装

Standard export pack is a 25 kg PP woven bag with a food-grade PE liner. Vacuum and nitrogen-flushed packs are available for long-sea routes and for buyers who re-pack. Retail-ready and food-service packs can be produced to your artwork, under our brands or yours.

25 kg PP + PE liner
Vacuum / nitrogen option
Private label available
Lot code on every bag

Bag stacks inside the finished goods warehouse, close view

Bags palletised by lot, held off the floor before loading

Warehousing and container loading

仓储 · 装柜

Finished goods are palletised by lot and loaded with moisture-barrier film and container desiccant. FCL and LCL both run; for LCL we specify co-loading restrictions so the lot is never shipped beside a high-moisture cargo.

Palletised by lot
Desiccant + barrier film
FCL / LCL
Traceable to field

Documents that travel with the container

Document	What it does for you	Issued
Certificate of Analysis (COA)	Batch-level moisture, aflatoxin B1, pesticide residues, SO₂ — the sheet your QA team files	Per lot
Health Certificate	Required by most ASEAN and Greater China food importers at clearance	Per shipment
Phytosanitary Certificate	Plant-health clearance for the destination authority	Per shipment
Certificate of Origin — FORM E	ASEAN–China FTA preferential tariff for Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia, Singapore importers	Per shipment, on request
Certificate of Origin — general / FORM A	Origin proof for Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan and non-ASEAN destinations	Per shipment, on request
Halal certificate	Needed for Malaysia and Indonesia retail and food-service channels	Factory-level
Packing list & commercial invoice	Bag count, net/gross weight, HS code as prepared	Per shipment

FORM E is worth checking before you book: on a full container it can move the landed cost materially versus a general certificate of origin. Say the destination at inquiry stage and we quote with the right document set.

Credentials

A certified plant, not a trading desk

Product comes from certified Hunan factories — principally Hunan Lianmei Food Co., Ltd., a provincial key leading enterprise in agricultural industrialisation. Certificates are factory-level and audit-able.

Equity cooperation signing ceremony between Guangzhou Restaurant Group Likofu Food and Hunan Lianmei Food, 2021

A supplier the mooncake industry already trusts

In 2021 Guangzhou Restaurant Group's Likofu Food — one of China's largest mooncake and lotus-paste producers — signed an equity cooperation agreement with Hunan Lianmei Food. That is the strongest available signal for a lotus buyer: the people who buy lotus seed in the largest volume in China chose to own part of this plant.

For a buyer it means capacity is real, specifications are already written to a food-safety standard, and there is an existing reference customer whose requirements are stricter than most.

Provincial leading enterprise
Equity cooperation with Likofu (Guangzhou Restaurant Group)
GAP demonstration base

GAPGood Agricultural Practice · field level

ISO 9001Quality management system

HACCPHazard analysis, process level

HalalFor Malaysia & Indonesia channels

Green FoodA级绿色食品

OrganicOrganic production certification

Ask for the lot that fits your line

Tell us the grade, the application, the monthly volume and the destination port. You get a FOB or CIF quote with the correct document set, and samples before you commit to a container.

Request a quote See specifications