The village, which is tucked away in a mist-covered, hilly corner of Ningde and has many species of butterflies and other insects, aspires to earn from tourism as well.

But first, more hotels will have to be built nearby, village official Xiang Zhonghong says.

While many of Xiadang's young people are migrant workers elsewhere, more local jobs could mean an opportunity for them to return.

In the larger county of Shouning, where the village is located, a makerspace has been established to facilitate the marketing of tea and other agricultural items such as mushrooms, dried bamboo shoots, red beans and sweet potato vermicelli for cooperatives across a dozen villages and towns.

A few years ago in another county named Pingnan, a private cooperative was set up by seven people in the village of Lingxia. Now, 12 poor resident families are part of the initiative, which includes breeding snails and carp in lotus ponds that also serve as a base for lotus seeds - eaten as a snack in China.

Lu Dayong, president of the Pingnan Lingxia Plantation Cooperative, says the blooming lotuses bring tourists to the village but the outfit requires more technological support.

Analysts have previously commented in field journals that cooperatives will need further attention if China is to achieve its "green society" objective, not just for poverty alleviation.

A part of Nanping's rural earnings came from cooperatives in 2017. The collective income of its 1,632 villages, according to officials, was around 290 million yuan.

"Last year, 13,000 poor families joined cooperatives related to agriculture and agricultural tourism," says Wang Bin, the city's deputy mayor.

More than 6,000 such collective farms were launched.

China's history of rural cooperatives dates back to the 1930s, when both nationalists and communists encouraged the model. After a lull, it has witnessed a revival in the past decade, partly owing to the limitations of conventional farming in the face of industrialization.

Chen Changzhen, a 47-year-old resident of Cikou village in Nanping, says raising livestock was not productive, so he founded a bamboo cooperative. Around 1,300 people live in his village, where bamboo groves are in abundance. The bamboo shoots from his cooperative are sold in the more affluent Zhejiang province and in Shanghai.

Nanping has shut down some polluting husbandry businesses lately to protect its large forested area.

"We are working to enhance quality testing for agricultural products," says Wang, the deputy mayor, adding that branding was also being emphasized.

The local government is looking to boost a cottage liquor industry in the countryside through cooperatives.

Chen Changxing, 62, a resident of Nanping's Zhangdun village, makes liquor at home from grapes grown in the village under a poverty alleviation program.

"A cooperative helps me sell the bottles in Shenzhen (a city in southern China)," he says.

China was expected to provide more than 100 billion yuan for poverty relief this year, according to earlier media reports.

Xing Wen contributed to this story.

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