Explore the " Poetic Life and Faraway Places" of Beautiful Rural Areas Together! The 14th Jiangsu Province Rural Tourism Festival Launched

In Xinghua City, there are winding rivers and canals, with rapeseed flowers blooming as if in beauty contest, painting the fields golden. On March 31st, the 14th Jiangsu Province Rural Tourism Festival was launched at the Qianduo Rapeseed Flower Scenic Area in Xinghua, Taizhou, inviting visitors to enjoy the beautiful countryside with the "Charm of Jiangsu" in spring.

During the tourism festival, the provincial and city governments jointly launched three theme campaigns: "Charm of Jiangsu – Great Beauty of Four Seasons" for collection and display of hundreds of innovative rural tourism products, "Charm of Jiangsu - Rural Self-Driving Tour" activity, and "Charm of Jiangsu - Rural Media Tour" activity. All cities and counties around the province, based on their local characteristics, launched four categories of rural tourism festivals, rural health and leisure, rural parent-child fruit picking, and integration and innovation rural tourism and culture, with joint efforts and cultural tourism activities of more than 100 cities and counties.

At the site of press conference, "Touring Rural Areas and Promoting Consumption" released 107 innovative tourism products and projects to showcase the natural beauty, thriving industries, and wealthy rural population and provide tourists with richer travel options.

Alibaba, Meituan, Tongcheng, Tuniu, and Charm of Jiangsu platforms jointly launched boutique rural travel routes and products in Jiangsu, highlighting creative ways of play and customized themes to meet the needs of tourists for leisure and vacation in Jiangsu's countryside.

The launch ceremony for the "Rural Tourism E-loan" billion-yuan funding plan, jointly provided by the Provincial Department of Culture and Tourism and the Provincial Rural Credit Union, was held on-site. The rural commercial banks of Xuzhou, Suzhou, Yangzhou, and Xinghua respectively signed credit cooperation agreements with local cultural and tourism administrative departments; and the rural commercial banks of Nanjing, Wuxi, Changzhou and Jurong respectively signed credit cooperation agreements with the first four national key rural tourism towns including Nanjing Guli Sub-district.

The Xinghua Qianduo Town Workstation in Taizhou was officially unveiled. The village tourism resident instructor workstation is the ungraded version of the "Village Tourism Resident Instructor Action Plan", which realizes the improvement from point to station, from village to town, and from instructor entering the village to instructor group stationed in the village. Currently, our province has established one village tourism resident instructor workstation in Yixing Hufu Town in Wuxi , Xinghua Qianduo Town in Taizhou, and Tongshan Yizhuang Town in Xuzhou.

"The instructors will be stationed in batches, 2-3 days each time, to conduct professional and specific consultations on local rural tourism development," said Chen Jinsong, director of the Resource Development Department of the Provincial Department of Culture and Tourism. The establishment of resident instructor workstations will further gather more wisdom from different professional instructors, integrate more rural tourism resources, and promote the concentrated development of rural tourism in key areas.

Ten national key rural tourism villages in the fourth batch, including Taoyuan Village in Wuxi's Huishan District, and three national key rural tourism towns in the second batch, including Yongning Sub-district in Nanjing's Pukou District, were awarded.

"Xuebu Town is located on the beautiful Maoshan East Road, with the reputation of the blessed land and the eighth heavenly abode. It is a revolutionary old area with a long history and also a well-known growing area of green tea," said Zhang Jinbiao, the mayor of Xuebu Town in Changzhou, and four other responsible persons for the first batch of national key rural tourism towns in Jiangsu Province, who "took the stage" to promote the village and invite tourists. At the same time, videos of 174 village secretaries (directors) from the whole province promoting rural tourism were played on-site.

The launch ceremony of this year's Rural Tourism Festival was held in the form of "interconnected main and branch venues, participation of all cities and counties in the province, and online and offline operation". The main venue hosted activities such as "Come to Beautiful Villages Quickly" rural tourism featuring cultural and creative attractions, characteristic activities exhibition, exhibition of characteristic trends, intangible cultural heritage dynamic exhibition, "Zijin Cup" rural revitalization volunteer live broadcast, and "Lixiahe Culture" folk art performance. The 13 districts and cities in the province held activities at branch venues respectively and connected with the main venue through live broadcast. The branch venues in Changzhou, Nantong, Zhenjiang, and Suqian also displayed their rich local rural tourism features and wonderful cultural and tourism activities on the screens.