Interview: China Contributing Significantly to World Tourism: UNWTO Official

As the world s second largest economy with a population of more than 1.3 billion, China has made significant contributions to the development of world tourism in recent years, a senior official of the United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) said.

Release time : 2018-06-27 16:09:32

source : ECNS

overseas spending over 2016, he said, adding that the number of China's outbound tourists now accounts for 10 percent of the total of global tourists.

While being very happy to see that besides Asia-Pacific, Europe and North America, the Chinese tourists have started their trips to the destinations as far as Africa, he said that Europe and the Asia-Pacific regions have, in particular, benefited from such a large number of Chinese tourists in recent years. For example, Germany alone received over 10 million Chinese tourists last year while the Asia-Pacific region has the geographical advantages for Chinese tourists to visit.

"In 2012, China became the world's top spender in international tourism and has remained so ever since. We can say that this is indeed a great contribution to the world tourism market and no country in the world can match China in this regard," Zhu said.

He also voiced satisfaction with the Chinese tourists' reasonable travels and spending as well as their improved behaviors, saying that they deserve being treated with hospitality and respect as they have a higher quality than ever before during overseas trips.

The UNWTO official also urged Chinese tourists to protect their legitimate rights by not using irrational means.

"Excessively protecting their legal rights as tourists or by using irrational means will hurt the Chinese tourists' interests and tarnish the national image," Zhu said.

The UNWTO official expressed the hope that the world tourism will continue its strong momentum of development in the years to come and China will continue to play an important role in this process.