- http://quzhou.chinadaily.com.cn/2024-01/25/c_294194.htm
- http://quzhou.chinadaily.com.cn/2023-04/10/c_293670.htm
Kaihua County
Kaihua county borders Anhui, Jiangxi and Zhejiang provinces in East China. Covering an area of 2,236 sq km, Kaihua governs 14 towns and 255 villages with a total population of 358,700.
Kaihua features a good natural environment, green tea leaves, root carvings, and features weightlifting sports.
Kaihua is a State-level ecological county, which is home to large stretches of primitive forests, and 80.9 percent of its area is covered with thick forest. In addition, the biodiversity, vegetational cover, and air and water quality in the county rank among the top 10 in China, making it one of the nine places in the country with the best natural environment. Its Qianjiangyuan National Forest Park and Gutian Mountain State-level Natural Reserve are known as the Green Lung of East China and the Natural Oxygen Bar in China. In 2013, Kaihua proposed to develop itself in accordance with the standard of a national park.
Kaihua is the hometown of famous Longding tea leaves and among the top 10 counties in Zhejiang in the tea leaves industry. The tea plantations in Kaihua cover more than 8,000 hectares, and over 100,000 Kaihua natives are engaged in tea leaves-related businesses. Kaihua Longding tea leaves have been exported to more than 40 countries and regions and in 2017, the Kaihua Longding brand was valued at over 3.17 billion yuan ($461 million).
Kaihua is the hometown of root carving in China, which can be traced back to the Tang Dynasty (618-907). After more than 1,000 years of development, Kaihua's root carving art integrates Buddhism, aesthetics and ecology, and was listed as a Zhejiang intangible cultural heritage in 2007. The Root Palace Buddhist Cultural Tourism Zone in the county, currently the only root carving-theme park in the world, is home to more than 2,000 large-scale root carvings.
Kaihua is the weightlifting training base for Zhejiang teenagers and the reserve weightlifting athletes base in China. Sixty-three Kaihua natives have won the first six places at national teenager weightlifting competitions and 22 have become national athletes. Moreover, Kaihua is the hometown of Zhan Xugang, who won the weightlifting championship at Olympic Games for the second straight time.