World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC) President and CEO Julia Simpson said on September 29 that the recovery and growth of Chinese tourism is truly "incredible". WTTC reports indicate that China's travel and tourism industry will contribute $1.48 trillion to the national economy by the end of this year, up 150% compared to 2022.

The agency forecasts that the travel and tourism sector will create 74 million jobs in China this year, down 9% from 2019. By 2033, tourism will create 31 million more jobs, bringing the total number of jobs in the industry to 106 million, accounting for one-seventh of China's total employment.

"China is opening up and people are traveling again. The outlook for tourism and travel in China is very good. I believe China will become the largest tourism market in the world in the next 3-5 years," said Ms. Simpson.

According to WTTC, the US was the world's largest tourism market in 2018, followed by China, Japan, Germany and the UK. In 2023, the US will remain the largest market, followed by China and Germany.

China is in the midst of Golden Week (September 29-October 6) for National Day and the Mid-Autumn Festival. It is the longest holiday in China since pandemic-related travel restrictions were lifted in December. Hundreds of millions of Chinese tourists are expected to travel, boosting the country’s economy. During the weeklong holiday in May, about 274 million Chinese tourists traveled and spent $20.3 billion.

According to the Civil Aviation Administration of China, 21 million passengers are expected to travel by air during this holiday with more than 17,000 flights per day, about 80% of which are domestic flights.

This is in line with the forecast of online booking platform Trip.com. Boon Sian Chai, CEO, said that travel demand in China has recovered significantly, but domestic travel still accounts for three-quarters of total trips. This is also an issue pointed out in the WTTC report that the world's largest travel and tourism markets still rely heavily on domestic visitors.

Some of the popular foreign destinations for Chinese tourists are Thailand, Singapore, South Korea, Malaysia and further afield such as Australia and the UK.

“As flight frequencies start to increase later this year and next year, foreign tourist numbers will continue to increase,” Boon said.

Tu Nguyen (According to Xinhua, AP )