The Beautiful Mountain Village

Over the twenty years from 1995 to 2015, rural northeastern China underwent enormous changes, including the conversion of farmland back to forest, the abolition of agricultural taxes, and the establishment of new-era production cooperatives. Amid this sweeping tide of change, the heroine, Chen Xiuli, relied on her own hard work and ingenuity. She sold medicinal herbs and partnered with the government to establish a wild-vegetable processing plant, bringing the region’s natural treasures to markets around the world. Later, riding the wave of the government’s efforts to build a capital of medicinal herbs, Chen Xiuli adapted to the changing times and founded her own Chinese herbal medicine processing plant. By bringing local resources together, she forged a path to prosperity that suited her business’s growth while benefiting the local rural economy.