Top 10 Chinese Tourism News Items of 2011 1

1) The beginning of "Chinese Cultural Tourism"
A plan for "Chinese Cultural Tourism" was officially launched on January 1st, 2011. Last year, keeping this plan in mind, Tour China, Sample Culture (游中华品文化) was used as the main promotional theme throughout China's domestic tourism market. Abroad, China's National Tourism Office ran a tourism campaign in 140 countries and regions, which sought to promote China's rich and varied cultural tourism as a sort of "natural resource" – which is actually a pretty accurate way of putting it since, as we all know… China has thousands of years of culture and history, composed of a rich and varied group of ethnic cultures. China is home to 40 World Cultural Heritage and World Natural Heritage items, as well as 657 Intangible Cultural Heritage items, and 2,351 historical objects as well as 109 historical and cultural cities are being actively preserved. These treasures serve as the rich cultural foundation on which China's tourism industry is based. The launch of "Chinese Cultural Tourism" in 2011 hopes to use the experiences of cultural tourism to promote the prosperity and further development of China's vast and varied cultural heritage.

2) Shanghai Disney breaks ground
M-I-C, K-E-Y, M-O-U-S-E… Ten years in the making, the largest Chinese-foreign joint venture in the history of China's service industry (24.5 Billion RMB!), finally began construction of Shanghai Disney on April 8th, 2011. This project is seen as particularly important to the Yangtze River Delta region because even though it receives nearly a quarter of China's tourists and accounts for a third of China's tourism revenue, there are not that many prominent tourist attractions there (especially ones that cater to foreign tourists). The introduction of Shanghai Disney should help to fill that void.

3) Duty-free on Hainan Island
As of last April 20th, prior to departing Hainan, tourists were finally able to purchase duty-free goods at a special store in Sanya (with some restrictions, of course). On December 21st, the second duty-free shop, located at the Meilan Airport in Haikou, opened. Peopled are keeping a close eye on how this Hainan duty-free pilot project continues to develop, no doubt hoping (fingers crossed!) that it will eventually make its way to other parts of the country.

4) Xi'an International Horticultural Expo
Continuing China's recent string of ridiculously grandiose international events (See: Beijing Olympic Games, Shanghai World Expo), the 2011 Xi'an International Horticulture Expo was held from April 28th to October 22nd. During that time, more than 15 million people visited Xi'an for the Expo, providing a huge boost to the rest of the city's tourism industry and encouraging tourism development in other parts of Western China as well.

5) May 19th now officially celebrated as "China Tourism Day"
In 2011, the State Council mandated that henceforth, every May 19th would now be celebrated as "China Tourism Day". Partially created as an appreciation day for Xu Xiake (徐霞客游记), a noted Chinese traveller and geographer during the Ming Dynasty, and more partially created to raise interest in domestic tourism (and spending more!) from mainlanders, the "China Tourism Day" initiative makes it clear that increasing domestic tourism is viewed as a very important part of China's future development plan.