Over Half of China to Travel Next Week

More than 700 million people will go on vacation during China’s upcoming “Super Golden Week,” which combines the National Day and Mid-Autumn Festival holidays, according to recently released figures from the China Tourism Academy.

This year’s holidays are set to be especially lucrative for tourism destinations within China, industry statisticians said.

More than 60% of Chinese mainland residents plan to travel during the upcoming one-week holiday, compared with 50% last year, according to the China Tourism Academy, which is run by the country’s National Tourism Administration.

Six out of 10 October holiday tourists plan to stay within China, the academy added, a major increase from last year.

China’s tourism revenue during the long holiday is expected to reach 590 billion yuan ($88.86 billion), up 12.2% year-on-year, according to the academy.

“Upgraded” consumption, driven by a stable rise in Chinese people’s incomes, has created a good environment for “domestic residents’ growing desire to travel,” Tang Xiaoyun, chief statistician at the China Tourism Academy, told Caixin.

The top three mainland destinations are expected to be Beijing and the southern provinces of Yunnan and Hainan, according to online travel booking Ctrip, which based its predictions on bookings it had received by Sept. 18.

China’s capital topped the list for the third year in a row, as 587,000 flights to Beijing have been booked as of Sunday, according to state-owned information provider TravelSky Technology Ltd. This year, Haikou, capital of Hainan, has experienced the greatest annual increase in bookings — 35%.

An increase in high-end domestic travel in recent years has especially benefited destinations like Yunnan and Hainan, a Ctrip staffer told Caixin.

In contrast, the growth of international tourism by Chinese residents has plateaued around 5% over the past year, after several straight years of rapid expansion. Japan, Thailand, Hong Kong, South Korea and Taiwan are this year’s top overseas destinations for the October holiday, TravelSky’s figures show.

Contact reporter Teng Jing Xuan (jingxuanteng@caixin.com)