The development of Xixinan ancient village stands as one of the 11 highlighted projects for the district this year.

After its completion, the region could integrate tourism, leisure and holiday spending, healthy recuperation, cultural and creative functions.

The project would be implemented in three phases with total costs to reach 1 billion yuan ($158，165，282).

The first phase begins this year at a cost of 100 million yuan, focusing on 10 sub-projects, including a tourist reception center, reconstruction of Pingban Bridge, revival of Diaoxue Park, repairs of Lei'ai area, reconstruction of roads in Xibanjie and Zhongjie, Fengyang Forest ecological protections, repair villages and non-Anhui-style architecture, construction of the third phase: villagers placement, underground burying of electrical wires, telephone lines, and cable TV lines and sewage treatment.

More wedding photography companies have been lured to the Xixinan region for outdoor shooting locations. The town plans to hold the first "wedding photography festival" in October this year.

Hopefully, the event and other activities for photography lovers and the news media could boost construction of 100 shooting sites and an outdoor wedding photography base.

Xixinan set up a special working group to collect historical and cultural relics.

They collect, assemble, compile, expand and extract materials on local history, culture, architecture, river systems, people and folk tales, as well as legends by checking existing materials, filming and recording oral materials.

They invited well-known scholars for research on Anhui culture and the history of Xixinan. They visited and identified its history and culture to enhance the village project.

Edited by Fu Bo and Tom Mc Gregor(chinadaily.com.cn)