Overseas trips proving more popular due to visa changes
Print Edition
MORE people went overseas during the weeklong National Day holiday this year, tourism and civil aviation authorities said yesterday.
The National Tourism Administration said the number of overseas trips had risen because more countries were offering visa-free or visa-on-arrival policies to Chinese citizens.
South Korea, Thailand and Japan were the most popular destinations, the administration said.
Overall numbers for travel outside the Chinese mainland during the seven-day holiday have yet to be published by the government agency, but preliminary data showed that almost 970,000 mainland residents had visited Hong Kong, a 5.4 percent increase from last year, while Macau had attracted 752,400 visitors from the mainland, up 16.5 percent. Visits to Taiwan surged more than 50 percent to 26,700.
The administration said that 124 scenic spots surveyed on the mainland had received a total of 31.69 million tourists, up 3.8 percent, while Chinese spending on tickets at such sites had dropped 2.43 percent year on year to 1.6 billion yuan (US$261 million).
China’s Civil Aviation Administration also noted an increase in overseas travel.
China Southern Airlines, the country’s largest airline company, said that the number of passengers heading for overseas destinations surged 20 percent during the holiday, compared to a 4 percent rise in domestic flights.
NTA data showed domestic travelers during the first half of the year totalled 62.31 million, down 2.8 percent.
The China Tourism Academy forecast last month that China’s tourism deficit will exceed US$100 billion this year.
It predicted that around 116 million Chinese will travel and spend US$155 billion overseas this year, up 20 percent from 2013.
- About Us
- |
- Terms of Use
- |
-
RSS - |
- Privacy Policy
- |
- Contact Us
- |
- Shanghai Call Center: 962288
- |
- Tip-off hotline: 52920043
- 沪ICP证：沪ICP备05050403号-1
- |
- 互联网新闻信息服务许可证：31120180004
- |
- 网络视听许可证：0909346
- |
- 广播电视节目制作许可证：沪字第354号
- |
- 增值电信业务经营许可证：沪B2-20120012
Copyright © 1999- Shanghai Daily. All rights reserved.Preferably viewed with Internet Explorer 8 or newer browsers.
