China’s tourism, consumption sees steady recovery during Dragon Boat Festival holiday

China’s tourism and consumption picked up further during the three-day Dragon Boat Festival holiday, which ended on June 14, amid prevention and control measures for the novel coronavirus epidemic.

Chinese tourists made more than 89 million trips during the holiday, an increase of 94.1 percent year on year with a recovery to about 98.7 percent of pre-pandemic levels, according to data from the Ministry of Culture and Tourism.

People participate in a dragon boat race to celebrate the Dragon Boat Festival in Zigui County, central China's Hubei Province, June 14, 2021. China celebrated the Dragon Boat Festival on Monday to commemorate Qu Yuan, a patriotic poet from the Warring States Period (475-221 BC) believed to have been born in Zigui County. (Xinhua/Zheng Jiayu)

Tourism revenue reached 29.43 billion yuan (about $4.6 billion), up by 139.7 percent from last year with a recovery of 74.8 percent of the pre-pandemic levels, according to the ministry.

Xihaian New District in Qingdao city, a popular travel destination in east China’s Shandong province, launched a series of tourist activities for the holiday. On June 8, a seaweed-themed scenic spot opened, which received over 10,000 tourists in five days after its opening. During the holiday, more tourists flocked to the scenic area after having their health codes and body temperatures checked.

The district has refined its epidemic prevention and control requirements and rolled out new tourism products such as set-jetting - tourism to locations seen in TV shows or movies - in rural areas, according to an official from the district’s culture and tourism department.

China’s catering industry also prospered during the holiday. In east China’s Jiangsu province, the sector achieved restorative growth during this holiday period, while the total volume of retail sales in the sector was expected to reach or exceed that of the same period of 2019, according to Yu Xuerong, president of the Jiangsu Catering Industry Association.

Nanjing Impressions, a famous restaurant chain based in Nanjing, capital city of Jiangsu, is a vivid example of the province’s thriving catering businesses during the holiday. “We saw booming demand even before the holiday, and all our private dining rooms were booked out half a month in advance,” said the head of an outlet of the restaurant in the Confucius Temple scenic area in Nanjing.

According to Dahui Group, the owner of the chain, the total number of customers and sales volume of the restaurant’s outlets were expected to grow by 10 percent and 15 percent respectively during the three-day holiday compared with the same period in 2019.

Another highlight of holiday consumption was online and offline shopping. At an e-commerce industrial park in Yutian county, Tangshan city, north China’s Hebei province, a live-streaming advertising campaign was held on June 12 to help local food companies promote sales of zongzi, a traditional Chinese food made of glutinous rice wrapped in bamboo leaves that is eaten on Dragon Boat Festival. Within two hours, 30 live-streamers sold over 50,000 zongzi online.

Sales from brick-and-mortar stores also saw growth during the holiday. At a supermarket in Honggutan New District, Nanchang, east China’s Jiangxi province, sales exceeded 3 million yuan over the past week, registering a significant increase compared with the same period last year.