Livestreaming Turkmen waxes lyrical about river port's future

TAIYUAN — In a traditional building in Qikou, an ancient riverine town along the Yellow River, Charyyev Nuryagdy and his Chinese partner participated in a livestream show to introduce local farm products in early October.

The 25-year-old student from Turkmenistan, who studies international politics at Shanxi University, toured several regions along the Yellow River in Shanxi province several months ago.

Of all the places he visited, Nuryagdy found that Qikou was the most impressive — especially its unique Shanxi merchant culture, which like every other merchant culture in the world appreciates integrity and hard work — and chose the town for the livestream.

The Yellow River was an important shipping route in the past. Merchants would buy goods such as fur, wool and herbs coming down from further upriver and then transport them by land to cities including Shanxi's capital Taiyuan, Beijing and Tianjin. Qikou's geographical advantage made it an important port until the 1970s.

The town's glory gradually faded in the following decades as the transportation network improved along the Yellow River.

Now, thanks to the rise of cultural tourism and e-commerce, the former trade and transport hub has begun to thrive once again.

The livestream show Nuryagdy took part in to promote the sale of red dates was one of the highlights of Qikou's seventh Tourism and Culture Festival.

Guo Youshun, who has a little more than half a hectare of date trees in Kaiyang village, told Nuryagdy that sales of the fruit should bring his family about 30,000 yuan ($4,186) this year.

During his preliminary survey, Nuryagdy found that local processing enterprises had extended the production chain of agri-food.

"There are multiple higher value-added products such as date snacks and drinks," he said. "In the past, people could not even afford to buy enough food or clothing by farming, but now, their living standards have improved significantly, and some have even bought houses in the county seat."

Thanks to the improving environment and better infrastructure, tourism has become a pillar industry in Qikou. Li Shixi, an online celebrity, is one resident engaged in tourism.

"Running a bed-and-breakfast and working as a life model can make me more than 100,000 yuan a year, much more than farming," the 68-year-old told Nuryagdy.

Currently, about one-tenth of the town's population is engaged in tourism, and the ancient town is home to over 50 homestays.

"I also noticed that more young people are returning to start businesses, which adds vitality to the ancient town," said Nuryagdy, whose two-hour livestream show eventually attracted more than 200,000 viewers.

"With the development of new businesses, the future of Qikou will be even better," he said.

Xinhua