Written by Sophie Yu and Casey Hall
BEIJING/SHANGHAI (Reuters) – Chinese tourists are expected to take longer trips than last year during the Golden Week holiday that begins on Tuesday, but that will not necessarily lead to an increase in spending, travel industry experts said.
With the economy slowing and consumer confidence hovering above historic lows, they expect many travelers over the week-long National Day holiday will choose cheaper domestic or short-haul overseas destinations and take advantage of lower flight prices.
The holiday period has traditionally produced large numbers of Chinese travellers, especially abroad due to the long break. This year, the government expects the average number of daily trips taken by the country’s transportation sector to rise by only 0.7% year-on-year.
“It will be a good result if tourism spending remains steady compared to last year,” said Liu Simin, an official with the tourism arm of the Beijing-based research institute of the China Society for Future Studies. “People are more willing to travel when the economy is good, but when there is no economic growth, there is no tourism growth.”
Wang Xin, an office worker in Beijing, said she and her family would drive to Yangzhou, a city near Shanghai known for its lakes, gardens and fried rice.
“There are no tolls during the holiday, so we will drive instead of taking the train,” the 45-year-old said. “It’s better not to spend unnecessary money when the economy is like this. A lot of people lose their jobs, and at my age if that happened to me, I wouldn’t be able to find another job.”
Before the pandemic, her family’s Golden Week destinations included Singapore and the United States.
Low prices for airline tickets
Data from travel platform Flight Master indicates that domestic airfares are expected to be 21% lower than in the same period last year, while international economy class fares will be 25% lower than in 2023 and 7% lower than in 2019. .
The preferred international destinations for outbound travelers are expected to continue to be short-haul Asian hubs, such as Japan, South Korea, Thailand and Singapore.
Trip.com, China’s largest online travel agency, said the main destinations were in Asia, but it saw a big shift towards long-haul destinations such as Australia, New Zealand, Britain and France this year with longer stays.
“Travelers are likely to benefit from lower ticket prices to travel further, stay longer and upgrade to a higher-star hotel,” HSBC analysts said in a note.
Analysts said that while last week’s broad stimulus may have some impact on spending, it would likely be limited, and they expected purchases would likely reach 2023 levels but not exceed them over the holiday period.
Some foreign airlines, such as British Airways and Qantas Airways, have reduced or stopped their flights to China this year amid insufficient demand in addition to fierce price competition from local airlines.
Philippine Airlines AirAsia announced this month that it would halt flights between Manila and China by the fourth quarter, with local media citing its CEO as saying that China’s share of its traffic of 30% in 2019 had fallen to just 2% this year.
AirAsia did not immediately respond to a request for comment. However, there are exceptions. Korean Air said demand for regional travel is improving and this month announced the launch or reintroduction of several routes to and from China.