Shanxi enhances rural appeal with cultural and tourism brand initiatives

In recent years, North China's Shanxi province has been focusing on building national and provincial-level key rural tourism villages and towns by improving the digitization of rural tourism and creating rural cultural and tourism brands.

In the first quarter of this year, the province received 6.63 million rural tourists thanks to the growing popularity of its ecologically beautiful, distinctive, and high-quality rural tourism destinations.

In 2024, the Culture and Tourism Department of Shanxi Province has helped various regions to promote the construction of distinctive brands by innovatively developing rural tourism products such as agricultural sightseeing, agricultural research and learning, agricultural festivals, intangible cultural heritage experiences, folk performances, and outdoor camping.

Furthermore, by organizing a series of activities such as the "Farmers Harvest Festival", the province aims to strengthen the promotion of high-quality travel routes and boost the popularity of rural folk festival activities.

At the same time, Shanxi is working to integrate intangible cultural heritage workshops and protection and inheritance bases into the rural tourism routes, so as to promote local and nearby employment for rural residents and increase their incomes.

This year, the province will focus on implementing projects such as cultural relic protection and utilization, traditional village protection, and the preservation of agricultural civilization, and build a group of intangible cultural heritage exhibition and experience halls, folk museums, cultural stations, and rural study rooms in order to promote the integrated development of rural tourism and intangible cultural heritage.