Villagers build roads to prosperity in N China's Taihang Mountains

Aerial photo taken on March 7, 2023 shows people building stone walkways in Qinglongxia village of Huguan county, north China's Shanxi Province. (Xinhua/Zhan Yan)

Villagers from Qinglongxia village, Huguan county, north China's Shanxi Province, have been building walkways for tourists for the past over 700 days in the hope of bringing prosperity through tourism.

45-year-old Niu Hesong is a local villager who used to work for a newspaper. In 2017, after learning about poverty eradication efforts in other villages, he came up with the idea of building tourist walkways in his hometown.

However, the steep terrain of the Taihang Mountains made it difficult to bring up large machinery. Despite the enormous challenge involved in building roads by hand, Niu remained resolute and strongly believed that where there is a will, there is a way. He even resigned from his newspaper job and led the establishment of a walkway construction program. As the program advanced, more and more locals became involved in it. Building walkways became a common dream for them.

Niu and his companions cut rocks from mountains, with which they built over 1,000 stairs. By February 2023, villagers had already completed 3,500 meters of tourist walkways, using over 100,000 pieces of stone.

Their program inspired the county and township governments, which allocated a total of 50,000 yuan ($7,260) for road construction at the end of 2018. Other people also donated tents, beds, food and water.

The tourist walkways connect the scattered tourist attractions in a mountain path network. Many villagers have launched their agritainment businesses on this network to sell local produce.

Villagers have benefited from the opening of the walkways, and more and more of them have become involved in the construction program. At present, they are busy constructing a walking path to the top of the mountain. In the future, they plan to build plank roads that hang on the side of the cliffs.