China has many well-known beautiful cities. Now the country also wants to have more beautiful villages. Eastern China's Zhejiang Province has become a model for its success in improving the rural environment over the past fifteen years. Our reporter Hu Chao visited one village there to find out what's changed.

43-year-old Ye Hongtao is no longer a fisherman. His county initiated a five-year-long fishing ban, starting from this April. Now like many other residents in Xinlong village, Ye makes a living from his home-rental business. It brings him less profit than fishing, but he still supports the ban.

YE HONGTAO, VILLAGER XINLONG, TONGLU COUNTY, ZHEJIANG PROVINCE "If the water ecology gets better in the future, it will be good for all of us. I think our sacrifice will be worth it."

And, talking about better environments, Ye says he's happy to see a once dirty pond beside his house being turned into a clean one.

YE HONGTAO, VILLAGER XINLONG, TONGLU COUNTY, ZHEJIANG PROVINCE "It was so dirty and stinks in summer. We're all happy the local government worked on this pond and made it clean and beautiful."

Xinlong village is surrounded on three sides by rivers. And these streams all eventually flow into the Yangtze River.

HU CHAO, XINLONG VILLAGE TONGLU COUNTY, ZHEJIANG PROVINCE "In the past five years, improving water quality has been the main priority for improving the environment in Xinlong village. Local officials and villagers understand very well that the flowing water not only provides them with water for drinking and domestic use but also affects small and big rivers connected to it."

The village has not only cleaned up its five ponds but also made the water flow through them again by connecting them to the rivers. Local sewage treatment has also improved. From the outside, every treatment area looks more like a garden. All these efforts were encouraged by government investment worth hundreds of thousands of yuan. Now Xinlong has become a clean and beautiful village that attracts more and more visitors.

YE HONGBO, PARTY SECRETARY XINLONG VILLAGE, TONGLU COUNTY, ZHEJIANG PROVINCE "We used to be a small fishing village. Now we don't fish anymore but focus more on the home-rental business. We've seen how the improved environment here is bringing in more tourists. Our revenue has been increasing by around 10% annually in recent years." Hu Chao, CGTN, Tonglu County, Zhejiang Province."