A leaf of tea fragrance drifts overseas; diverse industries enrich mountain township
— Baotian dong and miao ethnic township in huitong county paints a new scroll of rural revitalization
Surrounded by layered green and misty mountains, tea fragrance tea wafts from Baotian. Nestled in the northwest of Huitong County, Baotian Dong and Miao Ethnic Township is home to harmonious mountains and waters, with pristine ecology and a forest coverage rate as high as 74.34%. Its 71,000 mu of woodland has nurtured an exceptionally rich greenness. Here, nearly 10,000 people from over 3,000 households of various ethnic groups live and work in peace and contentment.
In recent years, leveraging its ecological resources and cultural heritage, the Township has developed distinctive planting industries tailored to local conditions. It has gradually formed an industrial pattern centered on tourism and tea production, complemented with the coordinated growth of diverse specialty agriculture including fruits and vegetables, morel mushrooms, and oil-tea camellia. A vibrant scroll of rural revitalization characterized with thriving industries, a livable ecological environment, and rising incomes for local residents, is steadily unfolding across the village.
With an ecological foundation, The mountainous township nurtures the confidence and momentum for development.
Lush mountains and lucid waters are valuable assets for Baotian. The Township is naturally endowed with mild and humid climate, year-round misty clouds, abundant negative oxygen ions, and loose, fertile mountain soil. For this reason, it provides a natural incubator for the growth of specialty agriculture. Vast stretches of ecological tea gardens spread across the hillsides, with layer upon layer of tea ridges winding along the contours of the terrain. These gardens have been successively recognized as one of Hunan Province's "Top Ten Most Beautiful Tea Gardens" and a national "T20 Most Beautiful Ecological Tea Garden." These highly prestigious accolades have brought these once-hidden mountain tea gardens into the public spotlight.
The natural endowments extend far beyond the fragrance of tea. Within Baotian, the Liandao Miao Village harbors high-quality natural mineral water rich in metasilicic acid. According to professional surveys, the metasilicic acid content in the spring water reaches up to 52%, demonstrating immense potential for developing a premium drinking water industry.
The local cultural heritage is equally rich and vibrant. Liandao Miao Village is a municipal-level intangible cultural heritage village in Huaihua City. Intangible cultural heritage practices such as "Tea Hoeing Dance," "Straw Dragon Dance," "Climbing a Mountain of Swords and Walking through a Sea of Fire," Miao-style bamboo tube wine, and ancient method flower-and-fruit wine have been passed down through generations. The Qing Dynasty Longta Mountain Pagoda stands quietly, engraved with the vicissitudes of time. Traces of revolutionary history, ancient architectural relics, and ethnic customs complement each other, while ecological resources and humanistic heritage empower one another. Together, they provide rare cultural assets for the integrated development of agriculture, culture, and tourism, truly transforming lucid waters and lush mountains into invaluable assets that enrich the people and revitalize the township.
Guided by a single leaf, the fragrance of tea travels far across mountains and seas.
A single tea leaf stands as the foremost pillar industry for the Township, with its years of cultivation. It boasts a long and storied history of tea cultivation, with generations of tea farmers continuing the tradition of hard work. Today, the township’s tea garden area has reached over 13,000 mu, of which more than 5,000 mu have obtained organic certification, making it the core tea production base of Huitong County.
Relying on its excellent growing environment, the tea produced here is rich in inner qualities and boasts a distinctive flavor. The township champions two major local brands: "Huitong Chunhao" (Spring Tips) and "Huitong Hongcha" (Black Tea). The green tea features tightly twisted leaves, a lingering chestnut aroma, and a pronounced sweet aftertaste. The black tea offers a rich floral-honey fragrance with a bright orange-red liquor. Both teas have repeatedly won the "Tea Ancestor Shennong Cup" Gold Award for Famous and Premium Tea at the Hunan Tea Expo, earning widespread market recognition for their quality.
As fine wine fears a deep alley, efforts are required to send quality tea to the proper market. Not content with merely "growing well," Baotian has been making sustained efforts in brand building and market expansion, targeting overseas markets to open up sales channels. Its tea products now travel across oceans to regions including the European Union and Russia, with annual sales revenue from the tea industry surpassing 80 million yuan.
Capitalizing upon organic certification as a key driver, brand building as a guiding force, and the international market as a breakthrough, the Township is accelerating the transformation and upgrading of its tea industry from "growing well" to "selling well and building a strong brand." Its industry image and comprehensive benefits continue to improve. Once hidden deep in the mountains, its tea has now stepped out of Hunan and onto the international stage, turning tiny tea buds into "gold leaves" that drive steady income growth for local communities.
While reinforcing tea cultivation and export, Baotian has set its sights on the integration of tea and tourism, concentrating on advancing key projects. As a flagship project among Huitong's cultural tourism "Five Golden Flowers," the Baotian Tea Tourism Rural Complex involves a total investment of 120 million yuan, with a construction area of 7,636 square meters. Construction began in September 2024, and the project plans to develop ten distinctive business formats, including a hilltop club, tent hotels, art hotels, and a land art center. It is expected to be completed and operational around the Spring Festival of 2027. Once in operation, the complex will deeply integrate tea, tourism, and culture, serving not only as a benchmark project for the county's cultural tourism upgrade but also as a core engine driving the overall economic improvement of Baotian.
Leveraging its contiguous ecological tea gardens, intangible cultural heritage, and historical sites, Baotian Dong and Miao Ethnic Township is weaving together a chain of diverse tourism offerings—including tea garden sightseeing, tea-picking experiences, intangible cultural heritage exhibitions, red culture study tours, and wellness retreats. By transforming its ecological and cultural advantages into industrial and developmental strengths, Baotian is further expanding the value chain of the tea industry.
Diverse industries thrive side by side, bringing shared prosperity to the Township.
A single flower does not make spring; a hundred flowers in full bloom bring spring to the garden. While strengthening the tea industry as the "main engine," Baotian Dong and Miao Ethnic Township has adhered to local conditions by cultivating distinctive industries such as fruits and vegetables, morel mushrooms, and oil-tea camellia. This has built a multi-point supported, synergistically developed industrial matrix that enriches the people, driving agricultural structural optimization and efficiency improvement.
The fruit and vegetable industry serves as a "sweet handle" for increasing local incomes. The hundred-mu sweet corn base, mainly distributed in Liandao Miao Village and Sanxi Village, can achieve an average benefit of 1,500 yuan per mu. With its thin skin, juicy kernels, crisp sweetness, and the unique advantage of being edible raw, the corn has gained strong consumer favor since hitting the market. Citrus is a traditional advantageous fruit industry with broad coverage and strong driving capacity. The township's total citrus planting area exceeds 500 mu. Through variety improvement and technical refinement, output efficiency has been continuously enhanced, effectively boosting incomes for local farmers. The ginger base in Wangtian Village is growing vigorously, yielding up to 3,500 jin per mu. This has significantly strengthened the village collective economy, generating an additional income of over 120,000 yuan annually for the village while providing nearby employment opportunities for many villagers.
From winter fallow fields emerges a "ten-thousand-yuan-per-mu industry." Making full use of idle winter farmland and the local suitable temperature and humidity conditions, Baotian Dong and Miao Ethnic Township has successfully introduced and promoted the cultivation of morel mushrooms. In Wengliao Village, the township is building a "ten-thousand-yuan-per-mu" planting base spanning over 100 mu, complete with a supporting drying and processing facility for dried mushrooms. This initiative opens up a new path for optimizing the township's industrial structure, improving the multiple-cropping index of farmland, and enhancing output efficiency.
Oil-tea camellia, meanwhile, serves as a stable and long-lasting "iron-clad crop." The township currently has approximately 20,000 mu of oil-tea camellia forests. In recent years, it has continuously advanced the renovation of low-yield forests and the expansion of new plantings, completing over 500 mu of low-yield transformation and adding more than 100 mu of new oil-tea camellia forest each year. After renovation, the average benefit per mu of oil-tea camellia forest has increased to 2,000 yuan, providing lasting protection for the stable income of the mountain township's residents.
The ultimate goal of industrial development is to bring common prosperity to the people. From misty tea gardens to fruit and vegetable bases, from the tea-tourism complex to the understory of oil-tea camellia forests, Baotian Dong and Miao Ethnic Township has kept refining its mechanisms to involve and benefit farmers. Villagers can share in the dividends of industry through multiple channels: land transfers, on-base employment, dividend payouts from shares, and independent farming or breeding. With industries right at their doorstep, locals no longer need to travel far for work. They can take care of their families while earning a steady income, and village collective economies keep growing stronger.
Mist and clouds drift over the tea mountains, and thriving industries point toward the future. Standing at a new starting point, the Township will continue to delve into its ecological resources, polish the reputation of its tea brand, accelerate the construction of tea-tourism integration projects, and optimize its diverse specialty agriculture. By pursuing high-quality industrial development, it aims to inject stronger and more enduring momentum into rural revitalization—ensuring that in this land of Miao and Dong villages, the fragrance of tea forever lingers, industries remain ever-vibrant, and the people enjoy lasting prosperity.
(Translated by Dong Yue)