Vloggers help improve lives in the countryside

Looking sharp, Ma Liang stood on a podium surrounded by farmland and spoke in English and his local dialect about the specialties of the area where he grew up in the Ningxia Hui autonomous region in Northwest China.

"I have a strong sense of mission to create a new image of my home region by using English as well as local expressions to change the impression people may have of Ningxia," Ma says, adding that this is why he chose to return home to make short videos.

Ma graduated from Xi'an International Studies University in 2009 as an English major. He held a variety of jobs, took part in cultural exchange, and visited many countries.

In 2022, he decided to return home to Xiji county, Guyuan city, to start a new business with his friend Ma Haodong, a documentary film director.

"When I was younger, I ran away from this mountainous area, but now I've come back to develop a new understanding of my home," he says. "The loess landscapes of Ningxia are a big stage on which to start businesses."

To help make videos that best showcase his home, Ma Liang has sought inspiration in novels, poems and essays about the area. He has posted videos online promoting apples, potatoes and pumpkins, the latter taking him four months to make.

That hard work paid off, as the video drew 17 million views on social media platform Douyin and helped sell 60,000 kilograms of Xiji county pumpkins in just two weeks.

The success of Ma Liang and his team spotlights the booming e-commerce sector in rural China. In recent years, the country has boosted development of e-commerce in rural areas, helping 1,489 counties build 3,000 county-level e-commerce public service centers and logistics distribution centers, as well as 158,000 village-level e-commerce service sites.

As a result, produce and products can be quickly sent between cities and villages, and vice versa. As an important engine for promoting the development of rural industry, e-commerce has become a significant part of the national rural vitalization quest.

Another example worth noting is a video featuring Peng Bo, which introduces a local specialty in another part of China. Rice is the focus of this video, in which Peng speaks both English and a local dialect, and which went viral. To date, more than 200,000 kilograms of this rice from Wanjin village, Yuhong district, Shenyang, Northeast China's Liaoning province, have been sold.

"Through our videos, people have seen the beautiful rural scenery in Yuhong district and learned about its simple and honest folkway, as well as our agricultural products," says Peng, deputy head of the culture and tourism bureau of Yuhong district, Shenyang, adding that she wants to help bring real benefits to local people.