Professional Documents
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Tourism Management
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Research note
a r t i c l e i n f o
a b s t r a c t
Article history:
Received 28 August 2010
Accepted 15 December 2010
In the latest two decades, Rural Tourism (RT) has speedily developed and become an important concept
of tourism in China. However, there remains little understanding in the western world about RT for its
special role in Chinas rural socio-economic regeneration. This paper represents an attempt to analyze six
different models of RT development. More specically, the collective imagery of Nong jia le (Happy
Farmer Home) tourism, a Chinese version of rural tourism, is examined. The ndings of this study not
only highlight the widely-held beliefs about the important role of RT but also identify a number of
related problems and challenges facing its sustainable and healthy development in future, which
hopefully would stimulate the interest for further studies in this area.
2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords:
Rural tourism
Nong jia le tourism
Farm diversication
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or stigmatized layer associated with poverty, ignorance, insanitation, underdevelopment, backwardness, barbarism, stupidity.
Through integrating the cultural tourism and rural tourism,
the Nong jia le tourism appears to be as a new concept cultural
rural tourism (MacDonald & Jolliffe, 2003, quoted in Ying & Zhou,
2007) invested and operated by individual farmers and farmers
families, providing rustic meals (home-made meals) and accommodation (farmhouse) services and amusements for tourists and
vacationers who during the weekend and holidays leave their
homes in city to go, even if for a few hours, to enjoy Nong jia le.
Located in a rural setting of village or town, Nonjiales location,
usually a distinct rural community with its own traditions, heritage, arts, lifestyles, and values preserved between generations
(Ying & Zhou, 2007), combine historic and cultural heritage
elements and natural elements in a harmonious way. The main
feature of such villages and towns are a lack of polluting elements
that could destroy the aesthetic quality of the environment.
As Briedenhann and Wickens (2004) argued that rural tourists
have varied motivations, which might include ecological
uniqueness, special adventure opportunities, cultural attractions,
wild habitat, or the peace and quiet of the countryside in which
greater exibility and a more meaningful experience have gained
prominence.
Since the early 1990s when it carved out a career with the rst
cluster of Nong jia le in Chengdu, Sichuan Province (He, 2005),
Nong jia le tourism has become a popular rural tourism product
for the mass market it served from a market perspective. At its early
stage, Nong jia le tourism has been based on offering board and
lodging with rooms being rented in the owners private home or
rural campsites equivalent to Bed & Breakfast operations in
Europe and North America. The original purpose of Nong jia le
tourism was to complement incomes from agriculture as green
tourism without a threat to the main agricultural activity. As
a newly-coined word in Chinas tourism terminology, Nong jia le
tourism, with about 20 years of development, has got the salient
characteristic of leisure farm to experience and enjoy the
joyfulness of rural leisure life. Its products have evolved from
simple board and lodging operation to more specialized structure
and followed a strategy to capture a more demanding and diverse
consumers for the repeat visits. As Deller (2010) noted in the US
that for many parts of rural America today, the natural resources are
valued not for their direct contribution to the economy but rather
as latent inputs into non-market recreational activities. It is now
quite common for the owners of Nong jia le to substitute leisureoriented activities for agricultural activities, providing a number of
activities related to nature and local historic heritage interests such
as rafting, shing, local medicinal herb therapy, folk-custom
educational courses, fruit-picking, local cuisine recipe, sale of
home-made country products, etc., which is a trendy phenomenon,
especially in Chinas rural areas where agriculture is not economically competitive. By 2009, farmer families operating Nong jia le
in rural China have reached 1.3 millions in number (Sun, 2009).
It should be noted, however, that the trend toward diversication
and specialization of Nong jia le has emerged in recent years,
which include yu jia le (Happy Fishermen Home) in coastal areas
for the tourism related with marine activities; ethnic culture
tourism in rural areas inhabited by minority nationalities such as
Tibetans, Mongolians, Dai nationality, Hui nationality, etc.; folk
culture tourism in rural outskirts of Beijing. According to Canoves,
Villarino, Priestley, and Blanco (2004), this marks the maturity of
rural tourism, a clear path toward a higher degree of tourist
professionalism farmers regard as an image of quality in the eyes
of their clients, which, in some cases, gives rise to the question of
category on whether it is a form of agricultural diversication or
a commercial activity.
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