Donggangtun, a small village near the city of Harbin has made many changes over the past five years by using its advantageous location near a wetland park and at the mouth of the Hulan River, and it is gradually turning into a tourist destination, so now it wants to use its successful development experience to help other villages in Northeast China make some progress,

And many of its residents are opening rural home-inns and restaurants and, according to Hong Yonghua, the Party chief of the village, who notes that there are 16 farm-stays while another two will open this year and that the roads in the village are filled with cars during the peak season in summer even though many restaurants have their own parking lots.

The local catering business is not the only one benefiting from the wetland park, now that more than 500 villagers have gone from being farmers to being park employees, with a monthly salary of 2,000($308.8) - 4,000 yuan, and some have even started a small business such as selling swimwear and swimming equipment, bringing in around 20,000 yuan to the households each year.

However, these are not the biggest changes in this village -- house prices have seen an enormous surge, with a 400-square-meters-yard at the edge of the wetland that cost only 2,000 - 3,000 yuan 10 years ago, now going for many, many times that.

Hong, the Party chief attributes the significant increase in house prices to the good location and improved infrastructure and facilities and, according to another village head, Tian Xiaoguan, they will build more high-end accommodations, since the farm stays are not enough and fail to meet various tourist demands.