Tengtou Village of Fenghua, Zhejiang

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Tengtou Village is located in the northern part of the city of fenghua, Zhe jiang Province, about 6 kilometers from the central city district in the plains under the jurisdiction of the town of Xiaowangmiao. according to the Qing dynasty records of fenghua County(Emperor Guangxu), 90% of the population were surnamed Fu. The village is located in a vast open plain and is neat and clean, has good transportation facilities and a population that is simple and honest. The village was listed to the 1992″Global 500″for environmental protection by the United Nations Environment Program. In 1997 it was named as a”National environmental education base.”

Tengtou Village was formerly known as”Destitute Tengtou because of the poor conditions in the village. The surrounding rivers were narrow and the scattering of agricultural plots in the village were subject to year ly flooding. There were over 80 households with 401 people living in the village in 1949, mainly living off rice paddies.Out of the nearly 1, 000 mu of farmland, 60% was held by absentee landlords, leaving only 300 mu (including that of clans) for the local residents.

In the 1960s and 1970s the people of tengtou adopted an attitude of “nose to theand used their “carrying poles and shoulders to convert the more than 1, 200 plot of low-yield land of varying altitudes and sizes that were subject to yearly flooding intomore than 200 good plots. The new well-drained plots are all the same size and lined up in a north-south orientation thereby greatly improving the quality and size of harvest In the 1980s the people of tengtou began working very hard and making many sacrifices to develop local industry from one garment factory employing 27 people to 37 enterprises in four industrial zones today the tengtou group has an annual production output worth one billion yuan, making it the rural enterprise with the largest scale of operations and greatest total of tax and profits in China.

As the people of tengtou gradually began to prosper in the mid-1990s they stepped uptheir self-improvement efforts and began attaching more importance to the concept of sustainable development. Tengtou was named as a national-level model eco-friendly village and reached its goals for modernization of agriculture and the countryside ahead of schedule.

In addition to working to improve their material standard of living, the people of Tengtou also stepped up efforts to improve spiritual civilization, creating a village of simple and honest people with an excellent social atmosphere of unity and harmony among neighbors.

To improve living conditions, the simple utilitarian farm houses were demolished and replaced with deluxe modern houses with so that all the villagers could live in spacious and comfortable conditions, increasing the per capital housing of 40 square meters to 80 square meters. The village also provides welfare benefits such as medical insurance and old-age insurance for all its residents. There is not one economically deprived household in the village. All are living a comfortable life.

While continuing to develop the tourist industry, tengtou village is also developing and making use of new scenic spots while ensuring that buildings in th llage fit in well with the natural environment. For tourists interested in agriculture there is the Plant Cultivation Sightseeing Park, the Flower, Grass and Tre Appreciation Zone and the Seed and Seedling Cultivation Base and Seasonal fruit and Melon Patch, where visitors can pick their own fruit and melons. tourists interested in customs and traditions can participate in activities such as spinning and weaving, crossing the fields on footpaths between plots, drawing water with a water wheel, and hulling the spring rice and see trail blazing animal performances such as bull fighting, goat fighting, pig races and cock fighting.

Tengtou Village pursues a civilized development path of working to expand production, increase standard of living and maintain an excellent ecological environmentwhile maintaining a balance among rapid economic development, environmental concerns and the building of spiritual civilization. The village has become a model exemplar of the eco friendly, modern, new socialist countryside.