Corn Village Transforms into Flower Town, Rural Tourism Earns 20 Million in Two Months
Wanlong Village in Shihao Town, Qijiang District, Chongqing, once a "tough nut" in the battle against poverty, has in recent years leveraged its high altitude and good ecology to develop leisure agriculture, achieving a transformation from a "corn village" to a "flower town." The Huaba camping festival held by the village has generated comprehensive tourism revenue of 20 million yuan over the past two months.
Flowers not only delight visitors' eyes but also "fatten" the wallets of villagers in this impoverished village. Wanlong Village in Shihao Town, Qijiang District, Chongqing, once a "tough nut" in the battle against poverty, has in recent years leveraged its high altitude and good ecology to develop leisure tourism, achieving a transformation from a“corn village to a "flower town." Yesterday, reporters learned from Wanlong Village that the Huaba camping festival held by the village has generated comprehensive tourism revenue of 20 million yuan over the past two months.
Exiting at the Anwen toll station on the Chongqing-Guizhou Expressway and following the winding mountain road past patches of Gesang flowers, cosmos, and sunflowers, one arrives at Wanlong Village, situated at an altitude of 1400 m and known as "Chongqing's Shangri-La." This small village, which once had only about twenty households, is now a "flower town" gathering over a hundred farming families: every farmhouse has dark red outer walls, looking particularly bright and beautiful against the blue sky and white clouds.
Zhang Wenye, Party Secretary of Shihao Town, told reporters that Wanlong Village borders Guizhou to the east, south, and west. In earlier years, due to poor transportation and lagging industrial development, it was widely known as a "major corn-growing village."
In recent years, with the boom in leisure tourism, Wanlong Village has gradually revealed its advantages: high altitude and cool summers; little development and good ecology, with a forest coverage rate of 80.2%.
As a "tough nut" in the district's poverty alleviation efforts, Wanlong's development has received attention from the district and town Party committees and governments. The district widened and asphalted the roads connecting Wanlong to the outside world, brought in a tourism company to develop four clusters -- Huaba, Ligongba, Rose Valley, and Flower Sea Stone Forest -- and planned and built five major areas: sports adventure, pastoral charm, lake leisure, wellness vacation, and cultural sightseeing.
"To make the 'flower town' live up to its name, we use 'flowers' to connect and decorate each cluster," said Zhang Wenye. This year, Wanlong Village planted large quantities of alpine roses, lupines, cosmos, sunflowers, and more, using 1500 kg of flower seeds alone.
Now both inside and outside the scenic area are seas of flowers, with flowers surrounding every farmhouse front and back, and the "flower town" makes visitors linger. In 2014, when the first camping tourism season was held, the village received over 90,000 visitor trips.
"Now the hotter it gets in the main city, the more popular Huaba tourism becomes," said Li Mingtie, Party Branch Secretary of the village. Last weekend, two to three thousand visitors came to admire the flowers and camp. Colorful tents bloom like "little flowers" across the mountains and fields, making "Huaba" (Flower Dam) even more worthy of its name.
The arrival of tourists has opened a new path for villagers to escape poverty. Wan Xuewen of the Second Cooperative was once a well-known poor household in the village: his wife was ill, his son had gone out to work and had not been heard from for several years, and he himself could not do heavy work due to disability, making life quite difficult for the family.
With the advancement of Huaba scenic area development, Wan Xuewen, with the help of the local Party committee and government, renovated his home and opened a farmstay restaurant providing three meals a day for visitors. Since the Huaba camping festival began on June 18 this year, he has received over 300 visitor trips and earned four to five thousand yuan.
"Now we're also 'enjoying the good fortune' thanks to Huaba," said Zhao Fuqing, a villager over sixty years old, who has never worked outside because of his frail health. Now he has transferred his 10 mu of land to the village's major corn grower and works at a farmstay restaurant himself, earning 1400 yuan per month in addition to land transfer income.
With the "flower town" as the "center," many surrounding villages and even some townships have also benefited from tourism development. Datong TownYangChacun villager Qiu Long, after tourism took off in Wanlong Village, rides a tricycle to deliver rice, oil, beverages, and other supplies to farmstay restaurants on the mountain, earning three to four thousand yuan per month.
According to incomplete statistics, more than 30 farmstay restaurants have sprung up in Wanlong Village, about 30% of the village's residents directly earn a living from tourism, and more than 30 poor households in the village have escaped poverty as a result. More than 300 people in and around the village are engaged in transportation thanks to the tailwind of tourism, earning substantial incomes.
The development of tourism in Wanlong Village has also driven the village to develop over 3000 mu of waxy corn, over 10,000 mu of square bamboo shoots, and over 500 mu of off-season vegetables.