NANJING, China, Sept. 30, 2020 /PRNewswire/ — In July 2010, Angelo Vasaro, the then vice president of the International Cittaslow Alliance, visited Gaochun. He couldn’t help but sigh, "This is really like a slow city." This is China’s first Cittaslow, Yaxi, Gaochun. In November 2010, Gaochun Yaxi’s "Ecological Journey" passed the certification of the International Cittaslow Alliance, and since then started the "sinicization" of Cittaslow, according to Gaochun International Cittaslow Administrative Committee.
Golden Flower Sea of Gaochun International Cittaslow
After ten years of development, Gaochun took "slow" as its soul and formed the concept of "Cittaslow" of "taste slow life and share happiness", and cultivated the "Mountain Cittaslow" in the east, "Cultural Cittaslow" in the middle, and "Watery Cittaslow" in the west. "Slow" has become Gaochun’s unique landscape and characteristic competitiveness, realizing a whole-region eco-tourism pattern with mountains, greenery, and water systems.
After ten years of exploration, Gaochun has explored a "Cittaslow+" development road with unique Gaochun characteristics. Rivers, mountains, local culture, and folk customs are Gaochun’s most precious wealth. It strives to explore the development model of Cittaslow and the diversified integration of culture, agriculture, tourism, sports, etc., and has successfully launched Cittaslow festival brands such as Golden Flower Festival, Lotus Festival, Crab Festival. It gradually creates a "Gaochun model" with ecological environment, green industry and cultural protection which is in line with Cittaslow concept.
With ten years of hard work, Gaochun, the Chinese headquarters of China Cittaslow Network, has worked hard to build an international tourism and cultural exchange platform, successfully hosting international conferences and cultural tourism sports such as the Cittaslow Coordination Meeting, and Gaochun International Cittaslow Marathon. During the event, sister cities were established with Mirande, France and Lidzbark, Poland, to build a bridge of communication with world’s Cittaslow. Under the guidance of Gaochun, 11 regions including Yanyang in Meizhou, Guangdong and Qufu in Shandong have been successfully recommended to join the International Cittaslow, making the road to the sinicization of the International Cittaslow wider and wider.
Cittaslow is the place where people can enjoy all the scenery of the year. Cittaslow is also the place that they can observe fruitful development and the "Chinese quality" of last ten years. In the next ten years, Gaochun set out again to meet future opportunities and challenges with a more vigorous fighting spirit.