With China's rapid economic growth and continuous improvement in living standards, the population faces increasing challenges to physical and mental health due to occupational stress and environmental degradation, resulting in widespread suboptimal health status. Concurrently, the expanding elderly demographic has intensified societal demand for health preservation services. This evolving context suggests that the integration of therapeutic interventions with tourism experiences represents a critical direction for sustainable tourism development. This study focuses on forest therapy tourism as an emerging paradigm, conducting a systematic investigation through literature review, comparative analysis, and field investigations at the Majiahe Forest Therapy Base. Our research identifies three primary challenges in current development practices: insufficient multi-disciplinary integration in product design, inadequate scientific evaluation systems for therapeutic effects, and suboptimal community participation mechanisms. We propose a tripartite optimization strategy encompassing ecological service function enhancement, smart health management system implementation, and stakeholder collaboration model innovation. The case study contributes to theoretical frameworks for forest therapy tourism planning while providing practical references for the standardized development of China's health tourism industry. This research holds particular significance for addressing urban population health management needs and promoting green economy transformation in forest resource-rich regions.

The development of urban enterprises attracts more and more rural labor to move to cities and towns, but the concentration of enterprises and population is a double-edged sword [1]. On the one hand, it will provide convenience for people's life and work [2], and on the other hand, it will make the living environment relatively worse [3], which is most prominent in the two aspects of air pollution and water pollution [4]. At the same time, residents in densely populated areas have a faster pace of life [5], greater work pressure, a high incidence of obesity and respiratory diseases, and their bodies are in a long-term state of sub-health [6]. Forest health, a new way of forest tourism, came into being. It has been scientifically proven that the forest environment is beneficial to people's physical and mental health [7]. Forest health care is helpful to relieve people's mental stress, but also has the effect of enhancing the activity of immune cells. Forest health has pointed out a new way for the development of forestry [8]. At the same time, it will also promote the construction of ecological civilization and help realize the goal of healthy China [9].

Studies on the efficacy of forest health can be traced back to the 1980s. Kaplan [10], Eda Turanci [7] and other scholars found in their studies that forest plants are beneficial to people's health, and pointed out that forest environment can relieve people's pressure and promote rehabilitation. Grahn and Stigsdotter [2] investigated and compared the health status of residents in open green Spaces and other locations in nine Swedish cities and concluded that green Spaces and forest parks have a positive impact on people's physical health. Cheakin [11] pointed out that the volatile secretions of forest plants can relax people physically and mentally and promote the recovery of patients. Ryushi [5] compared the forest walking project with the hot spring bath and found that both could relieve stress and promote recovery to a certain extent. The experiment conducted by Yasuo Ohe [12] and other scholars in Zhitou region in western Japan verified that forest tourism is beneficial to the relaxation of urban residents.

Dan He [13] et al pointed out that with the continuous exploration of forest health tourism, people's understanding of forest health tourism has become more and more profound, which also makes the construction of forest health tourism project attract more and more people's attention. Graham Hunt once pointed out that the construction and development of forest health tourism projects must pay attention to the protection of natural resources and achieve scientific development. Bixia Chen [14] et al also pointed out that the planning and implementation of forest health tourism projects can achieve both ecological and economic benefits only with the support of local communities and economic groups. Konu [15], when guiding the development of health care services, made full use of virtual products to test tourists to understand their demand for forest health care projects.

The development prospect of forest health resources in mountain area is studied from many aspects and resource evaluation is carried out. Pan Yangliu et al. established a forest health resource evaluation system based on climate suitability, landscape beauty, resource richness and cleanliness [16]. While the practice of forest health tourism has been actively carried out at home and abroad, the heat of theoretical research on it has also been very high. From the perspective of research content, the concept definition, development mode and direction and market demand of health tourism are the research focus of domestic and foreign scholars. Since foreign scholars began to study health tourism earlier, now they mainly focus on practical research. In contrast, due to the late start of domestic research on health tourism, it is still in the exploration stage, and focuses on medical health and forest health, and pays more attention to the rational development and utilization of tourism resources [16]. However, due to the lack of theoretical research, it falls behind the development requirements of the industry. Domestic and foreign scholars have little research on the motivation of health tourists, and have not done in-depth research on the information such as the preference of tourism consumption. Therefore, their evaluation of the construction and development potential of health tourism destinations is also insufficient. As far as research methods are concerned, the current research focuses on qualitative research. Case analysis and document analysis are commonly used by scholars [17]. Quantitative analysis is in a dispensable auxiliary position in the current research, and few techniques such as quantitative statistics and spatial measurement are used in the research process. On the other hand, although some scholars have established the evaluation system of health tourism resources, they seldom make a holistic and systematic analysis of tourism resources.

Majiahe District has the advantages of natural environment and geographical environment, rich tourism resources, numerous tourist attractions, not only has the beautiful scenery also has a strong historical charm. This paper makes a detailed evaluation of the tourism resources of Majahe Town according to the previous research methods on tourism areas, and analyzes the evaluation results in detail. This paper makes a detailed evaluation from the aspects of tourism resource advantages, location advantages, cultural advantages, tourism supporting advantages and disadvantages, and recommends the main construction contents of Majiahe National Forest health Base, and strives to create a more pleasant, environmentally friendly tourism project that can drive the economic development of the whole region.

Literature research method: With the help of Internet resources and library books, the literature on forest health tourism was collected and sorted out. The collation and analysis of relevant data is helpful to understand the concept, connotation, characteristics and development of forest health care theoretically. At the same time, by reading materials from case studies, policies and statistics, as well as relevant information collected from the field, we will gain a better understanding of the development of forest health tourism.

Case analysis: Through analyzing and refining successful cases of forest health tourism projects at home and abroad, we can learn experience from actual projects. The necessary conditions of forest health tourism are summarized. On this basis, different development and operation management schemes can be designed according to the characteristics of different regions.

Field study method: Field visit to Jingmen Majiahe Forest Park Majiahe health pilot base. Through field visits, exchanges and field visits to the actual construction of development projects, the overall grasp of the development of Majiahe health pilot base tourism development.

3.1 Evaluate the tourism resources

Majiahe Town is located in the northwestern border of Jingmen and the periphery of Jingshan (Fig. 1a). It is a border town at the junction of Jingmen City, Yichang City and Xiangyang City. Mahe Town is adjacent to Dangyang and the original case of Yichang City in the west (Fig, 1b), Xiangyang City in the north, and Zhanghe Reservoir in the south (Fig. 1c), known as the "landscape gallery, poetry and painting Ma River" reputation (Fig. 1d). Majihe is one of the provincial ecological towns and an important part of the Zhanghe-Obvious Mausoleum scenic spot in western Hubei eco-tourism circle. The highest elevation of the town is 590 meters, the average elevation is 190 meters, the average annual temperature is 18 °C, and the four seasons change significantly. The town of Majiahe covers an area of 172 square kilometers, with an area of 13,000 mu of cultivated land and 225,000 mu of mountain forests, with a forest coverage rate of more than 88%. The town has 9 natural villages, 2720 households a total of 12,000 people, of which 8200 agricultural population. Majiahe town has a long history and numerous cultural relics and monuments. The Three Kingdoms Qinglin Village Castle, the Ming Dynasty rooftop view, the Qing Dynasty residence - ninety-nine rooms have long been famous. White bark pine, Bipazhou Bridge, millennium ancient ginkgo, Zhanghe headwater beach river, broken mountain cliff waterfall and many other ecological and cultural tourist attractions are fascinating, attracting a large number of tourists. In 2016, the number of tourists reached more than 100,000, and in 2017 and 2018, the number of tourist arrivals remained stable at more than 100,000. In 2019, the Red Leaf Cultural Festival held in Qinglin Zhaiguan Park Scenic Area made a breakthrough in the construction of the scenic area, and the annual reception of tourists reached more than 130,000 people.

Figure 1: Majiahe Town in Hubei Province (a) and the location in Jingmen (b). Majiahe Town land (c) and water distribution(d).
3.1. Evaluate the tourism resources

Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) is a systematic hierarchical weight analysis method. It is to build a multi-level and systematic structural model by analyzing the influencing factors of the mutual connection and restriction among the research objects. The weight ranking of each influencing factor is calculated by pairwise comparison, and the total ranking of all influencing factors is calculated by means of weighted sum.

3.1.1. The basic process of analytic hierarchy process

First of all, the evaluation scale of subjective evaluation should be selected. The "1-9 scale method" proposed by Satie quantifies subjective evaluation. The importance scale and its meaning are shown in Table 1.

According to the steps of the analytic hierarchy method, the optimal selection of tourism resources in Mahe Town is selected as the target layer. According to the evaluation criteria of tourism resources, the criterion layer and the scheme layer are determined. Build the hierarchy diagram shown in Fig. 2c.

Table 1: Importance scale and its meaning.
In order to ensure the scientific conclusion, the formula is expressed as：

…………………………………. (1)
To check the consistency of judgment thinking.

In order to test whether different judgment matrices have satisfactory consistency, it is also necessary to introduce the average random consistency index RI value of the judgment matrix, as shown in the following Table 2 and 3.
 

Table 2: Average random consistency index RI standard value table.
For a judgment matrix of order 1 or 2, there is always satisfactory consistency, When the order is greater than 2, the ratio between the consistency index CI of the judgment matrix and the average random consistency index RI of the same order is called the ratio of random consistency to the average random consistency index RI, which is called the random consistency ratio, and is recorded as CR.

it is considered that the judgment matrix has satisfactory consistency. The weight summary results are as follows table 4:
 

Table 3: Average random consistency index RI standard value
 

Table 4: Weight summary table

Therefore, the main categories of tourism resources in Mahe Town are as follows: cultural landscape > water scenery > biological landscape > sky and climate landscape > Ruins and relics > tourist goods > human activities > buildings and facilities.

3.1.2. Analysis of tourism resources evaluation results in Mahe Town

By using analytic hierarchy process to evaluate 8 main categories of tourism resources in Majiahe town, it can be seen that Majiahe Town has great advantages in creating national forest health tourism base.

First, from the perspective of the richness of tourism resources, Majiahe Town has rich types of tourism resources such as cultural landscape, water scenery, ruins, cultural activities, etc. After establishing a national forest health tourism base, Majiahe Town can not only provide tourists with beautiful scenic spots for viewing and playing, but also provide tourists with good places for health and wellness. In the Internet era, health knowledge through the continuous popularization of smart phones and TV, people begin to pay more and more attention to their health status, health awareness has been improved, so it can also achieve the purpose of health and wellness during tourism, which is definitely a good place for tourists (Fig. 2a and 2b). Therefore, many tourism resources in Mahe Town can lay a resource foundation for the construction of national forest health tourism base.
 

Figure 2: Tourist Source Analysis Chart of Majiahe National Forest Health Base (a). Market positioning map of Majiahe National Forest Health Base (b). Industrial positioning map of Majiahe National Forest Health Base (c).
3. 2. The main construction content of Majiahe national forest health base.

3. 2. 1 partition the tourism function, Tourism function zoning construction:

Construction of special health areas, such as Majiahe Chinese Medicine Health Physiotherapy Center: The health physiotherapy center integrates comprehensive screening, evaluation, analysis, health records, etc., employs Chinese medicine experts to provide health consulting services for tourists, creates exclusive health files for each tourist, develops special sub-health conditioning and recuperation services for tourists according to their own health conditions, and forms professional health physiotherapy and management programs. Medicinal diet health care: Medicinal diet health care is relying on ginseng, lily, gastrodia, dendrobium officinale, heavy floor, ganoderma, local honey and other rare Chinese herbs and organic agricultural products planting resources, the development of Chinese medicinal materials, health food, health supplies. Carry out tourists' health care experience activities, and teach health care services such as five elements health exercise, Tai Chi and forest yoga. Ecological diet health: Use the natural conditions of the forest to plant characteristic Chinese herbs and edible fungi to promote the development of the economy under the forest. Breed local characteristic poultry, such as local pigs, bees, etc., plant characteristic fruits, tea, and create local characteristic health brand. At the same time, pay attention to strengthening the monitoring of the catering industry, standardize the construction of catering, and open Majiahe special food, health care and other food series. Medicinal Botanical Garden: The park creatively replaces traditional flowers and trees with medicinal plants, and achieves the effect of cultivation, ornamental, popular science and medicinal use. It is committed to creating a landscape garden space suitable for the elderly, tourists to rest, imagine, recuperate, and students to practice sketching and science popularization.

Construction forest health areas, such as traditional Chinese medicine and aromatic recuperative garden: herbal aromatic plants and coniferous forests are replanted in the stands. The recuperative garden contains a wealth of traditional Chinese medicine plants that are beneficial to the human body, Fendoxin. By taking advantage of the environment and terrain, leaf-shaped log deckchairs are set on the gentle slopes between the forests to provide people with a place to sit and lie down. Through exercise therapy and meditation, forest siesta, body scan, abdominal breathing, open the five senses experience activities, achieve stress reduction and relaxation, enhance energy, regulate breathing, and connect with nature. Forest health care forest: It is a combination of functional layout, relying on the health care function of vegetation and flower landscape and the construction of health care forest. The convalescent function of convalescent forest depends on the construction of convalescent forest. To build a forest health path, there are hills in the site, pine forest resources are rich, and the green design adds the spirit, color leaf trees, ginkgo, camphor, stillingium, maple fragrance, etc., to strengthen the sense of smell and sense of experience. Carry out health activities, sitting, watching and resting, and experience hearing, sight and touch with five senses. Healthy ecological hostel: With the concept of health and wellness, the development of forest wooden houses and characteristic homestays as space carriers, and vigorously create a healthy ecological hostel model with beautiful environment and supporting service facilities. It can provide tourists with a meditative and healthy lifestyle, so as to achieve the purpose of self-cultivation and three-nourishing. Innovation in tourism accommodation, the development of "farmhouse music", youth hotels, etc., the construction of local folk customs, rural inns. For young tourists, we can also develop professional living methods such as motorhomes and suburban camps. Design and develop the way of staying to meet the diversified needs of tourists.

Construction of forest sports areas, such as Health maintenance Trail: The site selection of the health maintenance Trail should be based on the gentle terrain, relying on the natural geographical location of rich forest resources, a wide variety of vegetation, near the mountains and rivers. The construction of the trail should avoid adding too much man-made materials, and mainly use natural and naturally formed materials. Nature observation trail: suitable for natural lush forests. The original natural forest without intervention is dominated by native tree species with local characteristics. Interpretive services can be provided for tourists, including the types of forest plants and animals, the evolution of forests and the natural functions of forests. Through strengthening the theory of forest health management, forest health multi-function, improve the management level of forest health, strengthen the supervision ability of forest health, and maintain the ecological health of forest environment. Forest bathing: The location of forest bathing should be mainly coniferous forests with high negative ion content, and the fresh air of the forest should be ensured. The forest meditation place is dominated by a dense forest with a quiet environment and a slightly tilted position. The ground is paved with gravel, and seats or recliners are placed in reasonable places for visitors to rest and meditate.

Then, manage the service area reasonably:

Medical complex building: With a construction area of 9,000 square meters, 200 beds and 4 nursing units, it is the medical service support of Majiahe National Forest Health Center, providing basic medical services and the research and application of traditional Chinese medicine for the nearby area. Elderly rehabilitation building: The construction area of 6708 square meters, with 180 beds, 6 nursing units, mainly to provide high-quality characteristics of physical examination services, treatment and rehabilitation services. Entertainment center for the elderly: with a construction area of 12,000 square meters, it has a leisure sports plaza, a professional bullring, a rhododendron sightseeing park, a rural grand theater, and complete entertainment facilities to meet the entertainment needs of the elderly. Convalescent Apartment: The building area is 36,000 square meters, the use of porch design, each household is set up with an entry garden, exclusive kitchen, vegetable garden, bathroom, mountain (sea) view sightseeing platform, which can provide high-end enjoyment for the elderly, ecological vacation style pension health services, health care apartment is also equipped with big data medical treatment, professional escort, nutrition and other functions. The full range of health and wellness services allows the elderly to enjoy a colorful lifestyle and spend their old age in peace. Medical Research Building: Construction area of 1800 square meters, with office area, conference center, mainly used for diabetes medicine research and development and display.

3. 2. 2 The construction of tourist attractions

Construction of major scenic spots. The first is the construction of the Qianhe Provincial Natural Art Wetland Park, in which there are many elderly or disabled tourists. Based on this situation, the park path should be used as far as possible, such as the horizontal terrain walk and other roads with few dangers and hidden dangers. The second is the rescue protection of the ninety-nine houses, the ninety-nine houses have a long history, the existing houses have been damaged, need to use modern technology to repair and protect, in order to ensure the history of the ninety-nine houses. The third is the construction of wine estates. In addition to bringing economic benefits, wine estates also have hidden ornamental value. Tourists will taste and buy wine at the same time, but also out of novelty psychology to enjoy the scenery of the estate and the wine manufacturing process. Therefore, we should continue to improve the environmental construction of the manor, broaden the marketing channels of wine, and improve its brand effect. The fourth is the construction of characteristic ecological breeding bases, carrying out projects such as picking gardens and farm work experience to improve the participation of tourists. Transformation of characteristic cultural blocks. It mainly includes: the first pair of 105 street-facing houses and streets in the market town; The second underground water grid line; Thirdly, the ecological restoration and supporting landscape construction of the river course outside the Majia River National Forest health Base are carried out to improve the tourist experience; The fourth is to repair and construct 10 rural folk culture points such as the ruins of Guandi Temple, Kangjia courtyard and Liaojia Dayu, and pay attention to the repair and protection of scenic spots while playing folk culture points.

3. 2. 3 Construction of tourism supporting service facilities

Building a visitor center. In order to give full play to the tourism function of Majiahe national forest health base, it is necessary to build tourism supporting service facilities. The first is to build a visitor center of about 2000 square meters, the visitor center is one of the essential service facilities of tourist attractions, which provides tour guides, emergency handling and other services, but also help tourists more smoothly sightseeing. Construction of centralized parking lot. The construction of two centralized parking lots, the function of the parking lot has been mentioned earlier, it is very necessary to build. In addition, Majiahe National Forest health Base is a good place for forest health, and some tourists generally stay in the base for a period of time to understand the specific knowledge of forest health. Therefore, the health base must take into account the problem of tourist parking, and build a centralized parking lot to solve the worries of tourists. Construction of sewage treatment plant. Construction of one sewage treatment plant for daily treatment of 600t sewage, construction of three environmental waste transfer stations, construction of 80 garbage collection points. Majiahe National Forest health Base in addition to play the tourism function, the more important is to play the forest health function, the base should pay great attention to the protection of its own environment, to enhance the garbage and sewage treatment capacity, to ensure the maintenance of the ecological environment of the base, to provide tourists with a green and healthy tourism environment. The fourth along the 347 National Road 50 km construction of rural landscape belt, the market town around the 10 characteristics of the farm upgrading. Majiahe National Forest health Base should not only pay attention to the construction of the base, but also pay attention to the construction of tourism supporting facilities around the base to improve the tourist comfort.

3. 2. 4 Transportation infrastructure construction.

Construct tourist highway ring line. The design of tourist highway should not only focus on road safety, but also pay attention to the construction of road landscape. On the basis of highway routes, tour buses are opened to provide diversified tourism functions. Specifically, it includes the Bipazhou Bridge with a distance of about 12.5km, the connecting line between National Highway 347 and Qianhe Wetland Park, the ring line between Qianhe Wetland Park and Qinglinzhai Scenic Area with Litie Highway, the connecting line between Mahe Town Jizhen and Songfeng Road with the outer ring road of Mahe Town, and the 13.5km ring line of the tourism road along Zhanghe Reservoir in Yibin Village of Mahe Town. At the same time, it is necessary to strengthen the road connection between Majia River national forest health base and Jingmen city center and the surrounding counties. Internal transportation planning. Strengthen the road construction of main roads and tourist attractions in the region, improve the road system of Majahe national forest health base, and improve the comprehensive technology and network level of rural road network; Expand the tourist routes of Majiahe National Forest health Base, repair the waterway wharf of Majiahe Town, and develop safe and orderly waterway passenger transport lines; The external roads of the tourist attraction will be upgraded. Improve transportation service facilities. The opening of tourist buses should cover the whole county area, realize the traffic of each county, and focus on the opening of buses between scenic spots, provide convenient transportation for foreign tourists, and strive to improve the level of traffic service; The use of environmentally friendly and pollution-free electric vehicle as a means of transportation for tourists sightseeing in the scenic area, the transportation on the waterway loop must ensure the safety and reliable performance, ensure the personal safety of tourists, and ensure the environmental protection of the transportation tools, not at the cost of polluting the water source; Build reasonable and efficient parking lots to solve the parking problem of private cars, tour buses and other vehicles, and equip service facilities such as gas stations and car maintenance points along the tour route.

Tourism industry is an indispensable part of China's social and economic development. Tourism is an important scale to judge people's living standards, and it is also a good way to carry forward culture and promote exchanges. Tourism is comprehensive and can achieve integration and common development with other industries. Therefore, tourism has become an important industry to promote the economic development of our country. The steady development of tourism has not only promoted the construction of ecological civilization, but also promoted the historical culture of our country. Tourism has highlighted its important role in the national economy and social progress.

In recent years, Mahe Town has actively created a famous tourist town in Hubei Province, actively improved tourism infrastructure, and built standardized, healthy and orderly scenic spots. Under the influence of the rapid development of tourism, the living standards of residents have improved significantly. Under the condition of unique natural resources, Majiahe national forest health base has continuously developed and grown, and its popularity has also improved significantly. Development is a process of constantly finding and solving problems. Therefore, after analyzing the field situation of Majiahe National Forest Health Base, this paper finds the existing problems, including obvious traffic bottlenecks, and certain defects in the status quo of highways and waterways; Lack of core attraction projects and government support. In this paper, we put forward some specific solutions to Majiahe national forest health base, in order to promote the tourism development of Majiahe national forest health base and make important contributions to China's economy

Pengfei Li: Writing – original draft. Xiepeng Geng: Data curation, Software. Ying Zhang: Writing – review & editing. 

Data will be made available on request.

Data is provided within the manuscript, for data we can contact the author Pengfei Li.