In Qingshen County, Sichuan Province, late-season citrus fruits are swelling during their August growth phase. Standing in his 317-acre contiguous orchard, Zhang Yunguo, manager of the Rongguo Family Farm, felt a deep sense of relief. He had just used climate data to secure a 200,000 yuan "Climate Value Loan" from the Qingshen County branch of Agricultural Bank of China. The funds now cover the upgrade of his orchard's water-fertilizer integration system and IoT equipment. "I've been growing citrus my whole life, but I never thought decades of planting records and the weather could truly become a credit asset recognized by the bank," Zhang reflected.

The issuance of this loan marks an innovative exploration in the financial support for rural revitalization. The People's Bank of China's Meishan City branch is actively guiding local financial institutions to deeply cultivate the "agriculture, rural areas, and farmers" sector. Focusing on local specialty industries, they are broadening financing channels for agricultural entities and enriching credit enhancement tools. As financial services advance, a more forward-looking question has emerged: beyond traditional collateral like property, can new elements such as meteorological data be transformed into credit assets, opening new pathways for agricultural loans?

This exploration found its starting point in Qingshen County. As the "Hometown of Late-Season Citrus in China," Qingshen has over 130,000 acres of citrus cultivation, generating an annual output value exceeding 2 billion yuan. However, it has long faced the dual challenges of vulnerability to weather conditions and a financing bottleneck where "there's an industry but a lack of collateral." The county is home to the province's only meteorological experimental base for late-season citrus, which has accumulated precise weather data. Yet, for a long time, this valuable data was only used for weather warnings, failing to unlock its industrial and financial value. This "sleeping resource" needed to be awakened.

In July of this year, Qingshen County issued a notice on promoting the "Climate Value Loan" to enhance agricultural climate resilience. It proposed a breakthrough strategy: integrating meteorological data credit enhancement, whitelist entity referrals, agricultural insurance risk-sharing, and a risk fund safety net into a coordinated "four-in-one" system. This constructs a full-chain service model encompassing "climate assessment—credit issuance—insurance linkage—post-loan risk control."

To facilitate rapid implementation, the People's Bank of China's Meishan branch guided the Meishan branch of Agricultural Bank of China to proactively coordinate with meteorological and agricultural departments. Together, they developed the "Climate Value Credit Service Plan" tailored to the local industry. By modeling and analyzing long-term weather observation data, specialized citrus experimental data, and real-time field IoT monitoring data, they created an objective, quantifiable climate credit score. Based on this score, management entities receive tiered credit limits: up to 100,000 yuan for A-level, 100,000 to 300,000 yuan for AA-level, and over 300,000 yuan for AAA-level. The score also determines a differentiated preferential interest rate, ranging from the Loan Prime Rate (LPR) plus or minus 10 basis points. This effectively transforms meteorological data into a quantifiable and creditworthy asset for agricultural growers.

Transitioning from "relying on the weather for a living" to "using data for loans," the "Climate Value Loan" is beginning to show its leverage effect. To date, the product has disbursed 16 million yuan, benefiting over 30 new agricultural business entities. A representative from the Meishan branch of Agricultural Bank of China stated, "The 'Climate Value Loan' has restructured the agricultural credit evaluation system. It uses big data to quantify agricultural risks, shifting grassroots operations from reluctance to make loans to confident, precise, and low-cost lending. This effectively addresses the pain points of traditional agricultural credit, such as information asymmetry and difficulty in risk control."

Looking out from Zhang Yunguo's 317-acre orchard, the 130,000 acres of late-season citrus groves in Qingshen County are nurturing a new harvest. Once only able to passively rely on the weather, farmers are now learning to actively use climate assessments, aided by the precise infusion of financial capital. This vivid leap from "climate data" to "tangible money" not only makes Qingshen's citrus industry more resilient but also writes a profoundly instructive footnote for how finance can empower rural revitalization.