AFTER last year’s announcement that Hangzhou’s government would build dozens of characteristic towns to develop Internet, cultural creative and local specialty industries, 41 towns have already received the investment of 43.8 billion yuan (US$6.77 billion) and have drawn interest from more than 3,000 enterprises. Annual gross income in 2015 reached 130 billion yuan and revenues amounted to 18 billion yuan. Shanghai Daily took a look at four of the towns.

Longwu Tea Town

Most of Hangzhou’s Longjing tea gardens are located in villages around Longwu. Since last year, the local government started to give the town a proper facelift. Villas were required to paint their walls white and their roofs black, aimed at creating identical appearances to match the beautiful surroundings. Roads, gardens and other infrastructure were also upgraded.

Millions have been invested and artists have helped with the designs while some villagers have converted their homes into family-run guesthouses or restaurants.

The government expects that the investment will turn the village into a new scenic area.

In addition to producing Longjing tea, the town also showcases the city’s centuries-old history of tea and tea culture. Every year during tea picking season, a large number of tourists flock here to buy freshly roasted tea and to hike in the rolling hills.

The first crop, or mingqian, of Longjing tea (the tea picked before the Qingming Festival), is considered the most expensive and is said to be of the highest quality. Tea picked between the Qingming Festival and Grain Rain (a solar term in lunar calendar) is the next highest grade and is known as yuqian, which literally means tea before Grain Rain.

In order to provide guests with high-end infrastructure, the town has built villas, resorts and tourist centers.

Waitongwu is a great example for a typical tea-picking village. It covers an area of 130 hectares and has been known as “home to loads of tea” since ancient times.

The village has 186,666 square meters of Longjing tea farms. When tea farmers used to roast tea at the same time, blackouts would occur from time to time, but with the new, upgraded electric system, the farmers can roast their tea leaves at the same time without any disruption.

All packaging is labeled with tags from the tea plantation.

In recent years, online shopping has had a negative effect on sales for the brick-and-mortar stores. In order to cash in on the e-commerce trend, young villagers began to sell tea through online shops, which has been very successful.

The local government has organized a series of training classes to teach middle-aged and elder villagers how to establish online stores on Taobao and WeChat.

Yichuang Town

Located nearby Xiangshan campus of China Academy of Art, Yichuang is being turned into a cultural and creative industry town for art design, exhibition, fashion, tourism and education industries. The Hangzhou government hopes the town will play a vital role in the future of the city’s art industry.

The town boasts rich educational resources, including the China Academy of Art and Zhejiang Conservatory of Music. The academy’s new Longshan campus will be built in the town to act as an educational base that cultivates advanced designers.

In addition, the two universities will cooperate with art institutes and training organizations to promote the integration of commerce, technology and art, forming an international cultural and creative education system.

Meanwhile, China Academy of Art’s Design Intelligence Award and the Design Institute of Landscape and Architecture will help gather talented professionals to the town, which aims to promote the development of local cultural brands and products.

Tianziling Jingmai Town

Tianziling is now home to the city’s largest landfill. More than 90 percent of the garbage produced in the downtown area is dumped there every day. Experts believe that the landfill will be completely full within five years.

In order to solve the problem, the Hangzhou government keeps developing recycling solutions and has introduced terminal disposal facilities in Tianziling. Last year, the government established Tianziling Jingmai Town, which is expected to be developed into an area for local green enterprises and industries.

The town is comprised of eight zones with 2,554,800 square meters, including environmental equipment research and development, renewable resources and logistics.

At the end of last year, construction of a kitchen garbage disposal facility project started. It covers an area of 8,666 square meters and will come into use at the end of this year. A sewage farm is also under construction, and another refuse incinerator will see construction soon.

Also, advanced technology will help turn garbage into new resources and products.

In the future, the landfill at Tianziling will be turned into a green tourist site with ecological, environmental and industrial properties. Tours around Tianziling will be available to raise awareness about environmental issues.

In order to boost the development of green industries, the local government is offering preferential policies to “green” enterprises in the town.

In the middle of this month, nine companies and organizations have signed contracts with local authorities, including Jiangsu Welle Environmental Technology Co, Hangzhou Library and Boiland Environmental Technology Group. These units aim to develop Tianziling into a versatile town.

Hangzhou Library will build a branch there with an emphasis on environmental protection. It will cover an area of 1,000 square meters with more than 100,000 books on ecology, environment and agriculture.

The library has been established through a crowd-funding campaign that encourages residents to donate their books. Besides being a place to read books, the library will also be a platform to promote conservation efforts.

Yunqi Town

With the aim to establish a local Silicon Valley, the Hangzhou government opened Yunqi Town earlier this year. It now houses 400-plus companies which employ 4,000 young people, most of them under the age of 30.

The town has been created for entrepreneurs — people with innovative ideas and an itch to test them and to be at the forefront of technological innovation.

Yunqi is expected to attract around 1,000 enterprises by the end of 2020 under the leadership of Aliyun, Intel, multinational electronics manufacturer Foxconn and Aviation Industry Corporation of China.

In order to improve the town’s environment, the original Liyu Hill will be rejuvenated into Yunqi Park that features better green belts, paved paths, and parking lots. Meanwhile, Zhijiang Hospital, schools, office buildings, residential blocks and other infrastructure will be completed in the next few years.

Yunqi Town is expected to boost tourism in Xihu District. In addition to the West Lake and the Xixi Wetland, the district also boasts traditional festivals like the Xixi Flower Festival, an international dragon boat competition and a Song Dynasty show.

At the same time, local businesses will benefit from the development as series of international MICE brands, competitions and meetings will be introduced, mostly centered around Yunqi International Conference Center, Zhejiang World Trade International Exhibition Center and the Huanglong commercial belt.