There are nearly 50,000 farmers live on water and wetlands in Changde city. Most of them used to reclaim wetlands for farmland, or other land use, and consequently, flooding risks increased and farmer have to fight against flooding every year. Since 1998 flooding, the government decided to restore wetland to increase flood retention capacity, and meanwhile to restore the habitat for migratory water birds and fishes. Local villagers were puzzled with their future, with the help of WWF and university research groups, Living Yangtze Program was launched at West Dongting Lake, and local fisherman and farmers were organized to conduct alternative livelihoods activities, such as eco-tourism, organic farming, and Eco-fishery.
For an instance, Qinshan Polder, a 800 ha reclaimed areas was a part of the West Dongting Lake Ramsar site, had been flooded in 1995, 1996 and 1998, it was impossible to repair the dyke economically after 1998 flooding. The government decided to support farmers to relocate their homes at nearby town, and farmers were organized to for diverse alternative livelihood, such as organize home-stay, boat trip to the marshes, eco-fishery, etc, etc. Their income had been tripled in three years time compared to three years ago. Most importantly, their income was based on the health wetlands. The better water quality, the better fish price, and more visitors come to stay at farmers house. Significantly increase of income from this areas had stimulated neighboring villages to participate in the wetland restoration.
The wetland based tourism projects within the urban areas include boat cruising, Marthon games and water sports after the restoration of Chuanzi River and Liuye Lake. Citizen are enjoying the improved environment, and carry on daily leisure sports along the river and lake side. The annual tourists reached to 1.37million, and the total annual income reached 20 million USD. In addition, theChuanzi River Cruise Company and Liuye Lake company employed 329 employees and 194 employees respectively.The river street has opened 111 shops, and the German town has opened 30 shops, where has been the hottest tourists attraction.