Former revolutionary base gets more visitors since facelift

Zhaojin, a small mountainous rural town in Tongchuan, Shaanxi province, has always attracted visitors through its modern architecture and red revolution history.

In 1933, a revolutionary base was set up there by Communist Party of China officials Liu Zhidan, Xie Zichang and Xi Zhongxun, the latter being the father of current President Xi Jinping.

"During the period before 1949, Zhaojin played an important role in the revolution, but like other old revolutionary bases it has suffered slow development being far away from the city, low employment and large urban and rural development gaps," said Wan Feng, town chief of Zhaojin.

With a total area of 244 sq km, Zhaojin township administers 188 villages and 11,233 people, of whom 10,927 are farmers.

The per capita average annual income of the town's population used to be no more than 6,000 yuan ($958) as the town's only industry is agriculture with a single crop, and a low level of agricultural modernization, Wan said.

From 2012, new urbanization construction began in Zhaojin, and the town has turned into a modern place with well-designed infrastructure and residential buildings and communities.

This winter, Zhaojin enjoyed a central heating system for the first time while residents of the other remote towns in the province still used coal stoves for heating, Wan said.

Pan Xishun, a 90-year-old Red Army soldier, said that he never dreamed of living in a residential apartment and was glad to see the small mountainous town became modern.

On Feb 14, the President visited the town and praised the development.

With urbanization, the township government has made efforts to develop tourism and introduced preferential policies to encourage farmers to take part in tourism activities to promote residents' income.

Official data shows per capita net annual income of the town's residents increased to 15,000 yuan last year from 7,450 yuan in 2011, much higher than the 6,503 yuan for farmers in Shaanxi province.