Not far from Xiaoxiangling Mountain, an area of natural beauty in the Liangshan Yi autonomous prefecture of Sichuan province, He Dinghong, 41, opened the first restaurant in Xiaoshan village two years ago.

The restaurant is located inside the ancient courier station of Dengxiangying, a hot spot in the architectural style of Ming (1368-1644) and Qing (1644-1911) dynasties along the Ancient Tea Horse Road, a trade route historically connecting Central and Southwest China with the Tibet autonomous region starting from the Tang Dynasty (618-907).

When azalea, beloved by people of the Yi ethnic group, blossoms in May, tourists flood in and He welcomes the busy season at his restaurant. Tourists coming from cities especially like the free-range chickens and pork in the countryside, He says.

He earned around 50,000 yuan ($7,461) in 2018 and nearly 20,000 yuan more in 2019, quite a better situation than before when he was keeping goats and planting potatoes that could only meet the family's life needs.

The idea of opening his own restaurant came from the village's farmer school which he has been attending since 2017. For months, He learned how to cook and treat guests during the two-hour class in early night.

That summer he was able to go to Chengdu, the provincial capital, for the first time. He was impressed by the city's charm and visited restaurants there. After the trip organized by the farmer school, he was inspired to have a restaurant of his own.

He still goes to the farmer school these days to improve cooking skills and learn running business as he's saving up and planning to start homestay service.

There are only two such restaurants in the village. However, locals go to the cooking class mainly to cultivate healthier, more economical eating habits. Traditionally, the Yi people have been used to a dish called tuotuorou, meaning to boil meat in large pieces, usually weighing 50 to 100 grams for one piece.

The farmer school of Xiaoshan village in Mianshan town, Xide county, is the first in the country.

The village with a population of 1,340 where locals used to plant potatoes and keep livestock for a living was once the only impoverished village in the town.

Some villagers bought young pigs in 2015 in hope of developing a breeding industry, but they failed. With an average altitude of 2,800 meters, all the 20 pigs froze to death that winter.

Therefore, in 2016, the village organized the locals to teach them how to properly breed livestock.

Lama Wusha, the village's agricultural technician, recalls the first classes: "At first the villagers didn't trust vaccines because the livestock would feel uncomfortable and didn't eat for the first days after injection."

However, as the livestock injected didn't get ill and survived the next year, the villagers began to trust the school and rushed for vaccines.

According to Zeng Siming, who is from the provincial department of emergency management and now taking a temporary post at the village's Party committee, the farmer school has held hundreds of classes over the past four years.

Zeng says they actively collect information about villagers' needs and invite professionals such as government officials, scholars, doctors, schoolteachers and also their fellow countrymen who have an expertise to give a lecture or demonstration.

For example, they have taught women bamboo weaving crafts and traditional Yi embroidery, and are trying to raise the locals' awareness of flood and forest fire in response to recent rainy season and the earlier fire disasters in spring.

As about 70 percent of the locals cannot read, and many ethnic people don't speak Mandarin, the village is also trying to put the lessons bilingually and teach the villagers some simple phrases of the language.

The farmer school also holds classes to improve young people's skills that can enable them to work in cities.

A dozen of young villagers who have learned to drive excavators and managed to pass the certificate test are now working at more developed coastal cities.

Around 400 villagers are working out in cities, and more than 200 have got qualification certificates of various occupations.

"Once there's one person out for work, the whole family is able to get rid of poverty," Zeng says.

For him, a more important sign of progress is that the villagers are more ambitious to expand their career possibilities. He tells the story of Jimu Erdimo as an example.

The woman in her thirties has four children to raise on her own. She was sponsored to start the one and only supermarket in the village several years ago. Now she's working in a city for a barbecue restaurant, in the hope that she can learn to run one and start her own business at home in the future.

Contact the writers at fangaiqing@chinadaily.com.cn