On April 1, Hunan Provincial Association for Science and Technology and Provincial Science and Technology Department officially authorized the Yizhang navel orange industry academician expert workstation led by Deng Xiuin, president of the Huazhong Agricultural University. The workstation became the province's first orange industry academician expert workstation.

Yizhang County was included in the national regional layout of agricultural products in 2002. It is the main producing areas of Southern Jiangxi – Southern Hunan – Northern Guangxi orange belt which is one of the three orange industrial belts in China and is also one of the 8 key counties of navel oranges in Hunan province.

Deng Xiuxin, born in Bali Town, Yizhang County, is the member of the NPC Standing Committee, academician of Chinese Academy of Engineering, vice president of China Science and Technology Association and chief scientist of the national modern agricultural orange industry technical system. Since 2002, the county has placed the navel orange industry as the "one county one product" pillar industry, and relying on the scientific research support of Huazhong Agricultural University, has carried out two rounds of large-scale, standardized and brand development.

The navel orange industry academician expert workstation, investment of 2.8 million yuan, covers an area of 30 mu, including office buildings, laboratory equipment, conference rooms, training rooms, student hostels, etc. Under the guidance of academician Deng Xiuxin and his expert team, the workstation will actively carry out seedling breeding, yield and quality improvement, integrated pest control, variety degradation control and other technical cooperation and promotion.

The establishment of the workstation will promote the navel orange industry in Yizhang and even Southern Hunan bigger and stronger, accelerate the transformation of new technologies and new achievements in the navel orange industry, improve comprehensive benefits and promote healthy and sustainable development of orange industry. By the end of 2016, the county's navel orange acreage has grown to 186,000 mu, the output of 93,000 tons and the output value of more than 500 million yuan.