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Chinese Travelers Switch to Domestic Trips

Hotels in Beijing, Shanghai, or Macau are sure to have even higher profits as there has been a decent shift in preferences of Chinese travelers. China is not only the biggest outbound travel market in the world but also has the largest domestic travel market. Of course, the country welcomes many foreign visitors, but they are still no match to the volume of the domestic traffic. Moreover, local people are even more inclined to travel within the country as the least reports show.

Last year, Chinese tourists made as many as 2.8 billion domestic trips. That is significantly more than the number of foreign trips that reached 136.5 million. When it comes to comparing expenditures of outbound and domestic trips, the difference is not so drastic – the total expenditures of trips abroad were US$220.6bn while the expenditures of tourists during domestic trips equaled to US$679.1bn. This information was provided by the famous analytics company GlobalData.

Experts foresee that domestic tourism will only grow in China as the country’s middle class is growing and has extra funds to spend on traveling, Moreover, thanks to the government support and investments in the industry, the tourist infrastructure keeps developing. Better transport makes different parts of the country more accessible. The situation has improved drastically since the Beijing Olympic Games in 2008.

The local hospitality industry is aware of the trend, so there has been a definite growth in the number of marketing campaigns and promotions advertising destinations within the country. Of course, international travel also becomes more affordable, but it still cannot compete with cheap domestic trips and so many Chinese prefer to spend their holidays in the country. Security and language troubles are also among the biggest reasons why so many Chinese prefer not to travel abroad.

For the Chinese government that is also profitable as the transport industry is mostly government owned. This includes airlines, trains, and highways. Moreover, most tourist attractions and historical landmarks are also state-owned. With domestic travel in bloom, the Chinese government gets higher revenues.

Last week, the UNWTO World Tourism Barometer has also published very interesting information regarding Chinese travelers. Chinese travelers strengthened their position as the biggest spenders in the world, overcoming the long-term leaders, travelers from the United States. Travelers from Germany occupy the third place, followed by the UK and France.

03.05.2018

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