Flowers Theme Town in Taiyuan [Photo/Taiyuan Daily]

Taiyuan city, capital of North China's Shanxi province, has identified the development of agricultural leisure as an important support for beefing up its mainstream agricultural sector and for boosting overall rural revitalization.

Agricultural leisure is a new type of rural commercial venture that utilizes agricultural landscape resources and agricultural production conditions to develop sightseeing, leisure and tourism.

Taiyuan has currently developed a number of agricultural leisure attractions and a "one-hour drive" agricultural leisure tourism circle. 

According to an official from the Taiyuan bureau of agriculture and rural affairs, the city has paid attention to the advantages of its wonderful natural scenery, history, culture and folk customs in developing popular agriculture leisure, forming various operations with different attractions. 

For instance, based on its rich historical and cultural resources as well as rice planting, the city's Jinyuan district has developed farm tours featuring natural scenery, folk customs and historical sites, as well as rice and flower-related industries.

Five rural leisure tourism belts have been in development in the city: the districts of Jinyuan, Jiancaoping and Wanbailin form the northwestern landscape and cultural leisure agriculture belt, while Qingxu county and Xiaodian district form the southern plain pastoral landscape appreciation belt. Yangqu county is typical of the northern loess style appreciation belt; the Fenhe River resort belt includes Loufan county and the county level city of Gujiao, while the districts of Xinghualing and Yingze form the East Mountain ecological agricultural sightseeing belt.

In addition, Taiyuan has strengthened the creative design of its agricultural products, promoted the appeals of its rural landscapes, repackaged its rural conservation and promoted rural culture and leisure venues. It has also developed various leisure interaction programs and leisure products with regional characteristics. 

Moving forward, plans are for Taiyuan to establish a leisure agriculture demonstration zone and 10 demonstration sites. It has started the core area construction of five major rural leisure tourist attractions, so as to upgrade the local agricultural leisure sector.