The largest population movement takes place in China around this time each year. As the Lunar New Year celebrations begin this Sunday in 2023, millions of citizens from other parts of the country or abroad are returning home. And many take advantage of the fact that it’s a week or two vacation to go abroad for a few days, especially in Asia and Europe. The pandemic has paralyzed everything, but Beijing’s decision to reopen borders in January after three years of isolation will gradually revive tourism activity throughout 2023, a year in which global tourism is striving to restore normality , which Covid-19 blew up.
The impact of the grand reopening on tourism – as some have christened the end of the severe restrictions imposed on the Asian giant over the past 33 months – was one of the topics discussed at this week’s International Tourism Fair (Fitur) in Madrid. There are high expectations for the impact the return of Chinese travelers will have. In addition, more Spaniards will travel to China again, a destination that has almost ceased to exist since March 2020. “Now all you have to do is present a PCR to enter the country,” says one of the staff at the China booth in Fitur, sitting next to a poster announcing the festival of Chinese gastronomy, which is being held this month to mark the entry of the year of the Hare is celebrated in the capital. The long quarantines are over.
Tourism from China has a very limited weight in Spain. In 2019, before the pandemic, just 699,000 travelers arrived from the Asian country, 0.8% of the record 84 million tourists the country received. But the cost per traveler was very high: about €2,500 per visitor three years ago, more than double that of the British (€965) and Germans (€1,077) and longer stays, according to data from the National Institute of Statistics. Before the pandemic, it was common for a group of Chinese travelers to exit a department store in central Madrid laden with luxury brand shopping bags and board the bus that was waiting for them in the street. The polls showed that a large majority agreed to return to Spain.
One of the Fitur pavilions that took place this week in Ifema (Madrid).Santi Burgos
“The Chinese visitor likes to shop and is very well prepared, very sensitive to trends, especially in technology: they want to pay for the purchase with the payment methods they know and what they find in the store is clearly explained in the app; it’s very convenient,” explains Elena Foguet, head of Value Retail business in Spain, the group that owns the Las Rozas Village (Madrid) and La Roca Village (Barcelona) shopping centers, which have a large number of international customers (they made 2019 50% off). Value Retail has nine other centers around the world, two of them in China. “We are very positive about the recovery of the sector and the reopening of China will provide a further boost,” says the manager.
The impact of China’s reopening on global tourism will be significant, considering that before 2020 it was the world’s largest source of tourism, with a total of 154 million international travelers and spending $254.6 billion in 2019, 17% of the world total , according to the World Tourism Organization (UNWTO). “The lifting of travel restrictions in China is a significant step for the recovery of the tourism sector in Asia and around the world,” the agency said in a statement released after the Asian country reopened. The main pre-pandemic destinations were in Asia (Hong Kong and Macau and especially the closest countries) and outside the region Russia, Canada, Italy, Turkey, UK, France and Spain. “In the near term, we expect a strong recovery in Asian destinations,” he adds. Everything depends on the availability and cost of air tickets and the restrictions that apply in other countries to travelers arriving from China (a PCR is required in Spain and other EU countries).
Tourists from mainland China visit the ruins of St. Paul’s Cathedral in Macau on January 18. Kanis Leung (AP)
It also remains to be seen how the Chinese economy and consumption develop to know to what extent the citizens of the Asian country can afford to travel to distant countries. 40% say they will not plan to visit abroad this year, despite the reopening, primarily for economic reasons, according to a Dragon Trail International survey conducted in early January. The Asian country’s gross domestic product (GDP) grew 3% in 2022, the second worst figure since 1970, and consumption is falling. The growth forecast for 2023 has improved with an increase of almost 5%.
Experts expect China’s return to be the final push for a full recovery in 2023. According to the latest data from UNWTO, more than 900 million tourists made international trips in 2022, twice as many as in 2021, although this number is still at 63% of the previous months. pandemic levels. In Spain, progress has been stronger: after two difficult years, 2020 and 2021, last year 85% of foreign tourist arrivals (71.5 million) recovered compared to 2019, despite the escalation of inflation, the increase in costs and the increase in mortgages that reduced the purchasing power of households and businesses. For example, the number of annual arrivals in Spain has increased by 70% over the past decade, while total spending has increased by 65% since 2012, according to INE.
Attracting Asian tourists is part of the sector’s strategy in Spain to target its offer to visitors with higher purchasing power, tourism that offers sun and sand but is combined with a cultural, urban and gastronomic offer. NH Group is one of the many companies trying to attract more customers from Asia. “Our goal was to have between 5% and 10% Asian customers in 2020, but the pandemic has crippled those plans,” said NH Hotel Group CEO Ramón Aragonés in Fitur.
Another business is selling trips for Spaniards to Asia, a continent that was one of the most popular travel destinations before the pandemic. “Last year, Spaniards’ trips were mainly domestic trips, which were considered safe destinations, and I think long-distance travel will recover more slowly,” explains Tomeu Bennasar, CEO of tour operator Soltour Travel Partners. “This year 2023 will be largely unknown, things are going very well at the moment but we’ll see what happens this summer,” he warns.
Airline ticket price
The ticket price is one of the major obstacles to the recovery of tourist travel from long-haul countries. Fuel costs, the impact of the dollar and a reduced supply of flights – airlines estimate capacity months in advance and it is difficult to adapt quickly to a sudden change in demand – have pushed up ticket prices. Rates are normalizing with America, Bennasar said, but it remains to be seen how Asia fares. In China, the supply of international yields is just 13% of pre-pandemic levels, according to data company VariFlight, while domestic market activity has fully recovered.
The war-related lack of tourism from China and especially Russia was offset in Spain by the increase in arrivals from other countries, especially America. Although the majority of tourists come from the United Kingdom, Germany and France, the growth of tourists from Mexico stands out: hotel nights spent by travelers from this country have increased by 17.6% according to data from Exceltur, which brings together the big companies in the Sector. “We’ve seen this trend of more arrivals from America for more than six years; In the center of Las Rozas, for example, in 2022 the number of customers from Latin America has grown by 150% compared to the previous year and by 250% from the United States,” explains Elena Foguet. The industry’s next goal: to recover Asia.
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