Students learn to use their noodles

A training school will be set up in Liuzhou, Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region, to capitalize on the growing popularity of river-snail noodles.

Officials hope the dish, also known as luosifen, will become a globally recognized culinary trademark of the city. Zheng Junkang, Party secretary of Liuzhou, said the city government is ready to promote the dish after the Luosi Rice Noodle Industry School was announced on May 28.

Liuzhou Vocational and Technical College signed a contract to run the school, which will train 500 students a year in marketing, advertising and production of the noodles.

Liang Xuhui, deputy Party secretary of Liuzhou, said the city government attaches great importance to the development of the luosifen industry, which is now worth more than 10 billion yuan ($1.43 billion) a year.

The production and sale of river-snail noodles have played an important role in the development of the city's economy, Liang said.

"The establishment of the luosifen school is expected to help advance the enterprise," Liang said, adding it would receive subsidies and policy support from the local government.

The dish takes its name from the broth, flavored with river snails, that ingredients such as rice noodles, pickled bamboo shoots, dried turnips, fresh vegetables and peanuts, are served in. The broth, when prepared properly, has a pungent odor due to the pickled bamboo.

An iconic dish in Liuzhou, packaged versions of the noodles became popular during the COVID-19 lockdown as its unique flavor and convenience won over customers staying inside their homes.

In March, Chen Dongwei, deputy director of the management committee of Yufeng District Industrial Park in Liuzhou, told Xinhua News Agency that sales of famous brands of the noodles had tripled from the same period last year.

Liang said at the launch ceremony for the school that he hoped its graduates could come up with innovative ideas to boost sales of the noodles.

According to Liang, the city's sales of packaged luosifen reached 6.26 billion yuan last year, and the industry employed more than 250,000 people. "Now the city is producing more than 2 million packages of luosifen a day, and selling them in both domestic and international markets," he said.

Liu Zilin, Party chief of Liuzhou Vocational and Technical College, said the luosifen school is the first of its type in the country and will begin accepting students in September. School subjects will also include food quality control and restaurant management, Liu said.

Ni Yaoyang, director of the Liuzhou Luosi Rice Noodle Industry Association, said Liuzhou's luosifen sales reached 13.5 billion yuan last year. "But the city still lacks skilled people to further boost development of the luosifen industry, especially when the dish is poised to become very popular at home and abroad," he said.

A worker cooks pickled bamboo shoots, an important ingredient for luosifen, at a workshop of an instant luosifen maker in Liuzhou, Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region. [Phot by Huang Xiaobang/Xinhua]