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CHINA GROWING GREEN GIANT OF TOURISM
Saturday, 01 Jun, 2010
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Massive figures hold the key to China green tourism growth
China now has two billion domestic tourists of which 200 million travel during National Day Golden Week: 50 million outbound tourists which puts it comfortably in the top 10 source markets with each outbound tourist spending an average of $6,000 a head in destinations and, apparently, over €1200 each in Europe on luxury goods.
Beijing alone (a city with no less than six ring roads each as big as the M25 around London) has 340,000 people directly and 1.7 million indirectly employed in tourism, currently providing hospitality for 167 million tourists who contributed some 244 billion yuan ($17bn) to the city’s income last year. The city has facilitated some 220,000 domestic and international conferences.
Big figures? The future, according to Beijing Tourism Administration is much, much bigger. The city aims to be the world’s number one as far as tourism is concerned and to make tourism its number one industry.
What does this mean? Simply put – 10% of all the city’s income will come from tourism raising over $10 billion from some 10 million inbound international tourists and no less than 200 million domestic tourists.
And a few more astonishing figures – the city of Beijing is to achieve all this through green tourism and is set to REDUCE its emissions by 20%. It will come as a surprise to many that a recent Marriott Hotel’s poll indicated that whilst some 50% of US citizens rate the environment highly and over 60% of Europeans – some 83% of Chinese feel that the environment is really important.
This is no mean task, but in a country that has grown, and is growing as quickly as China, it is very, very believable.
A visit to Beijing’s Capital International Airport says it all. Named by Conde Nast International Traveller as the ‘World’s Best Airport’ it is now the world’s third busiest airport with over 65 million passengers annually and it’s so big, it feels empty with the new terminal 3 (the second largest terminal in the world) just adding capacity.
It is pretty certain that China will become both the biggest destination and the biggest source market for world tourism within the next few years. It may also become the biggest green destination and possibly the most powerful market for green tourism. We will see. At the moment, with a domestic carrying twice the size of the rest of the world’s international one, they certainly have some growth to manage.
The key is that China has its own agenda. However much the developed countries have enjoyed the benefits of a maturing tourism marketplace, China is set to change the pace, and the rules. And the shade of green.
When China finally emerges as the global force in tourism within the next 5 years or so, the industry will never be the same again.
Valere Tjolle
Valere
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