Abstract: Rural tourism development and management is an issue worthy to be concerned with. By using the methods of participatory rural tourism appraisal and analytic hierarchy process, the issues of development strategies, development potential, operation mechanism, and interest coordination in relation to three designed models of rural tourism development in Moutuo village of Qiang Minority Community were discussed. The results revealed that market-oriented and resources-oriented rural tourism development models were fitful to Moutuo village at its primary stage of tourism development, and industry-oriented rural tourism development model had greater development potential. Polycentric management pattern should be introduced to the chosen models for overcoming the barriers of non-optimal characteristics and coordinating the interests of tourism involvers, while failure to do this could result in a destructive feedback loop, leading to the local ecosystem degradation and lower community support, and thus, the lose of competitiveness of rural tourism.

Key words: Conyza canadensis, Tolerance, Heavy metal