ABSTRACT OF THE KEYNOTE SPEECH BY DR. HONGGANG XU Chinese Outbound Tourism: Context, Perspective and Prospects

Abstract

The rising Chinese outbound tourism is one of the most important phenomena for the global tourism industries and tourism societies in recent years. However, the large scale of Chinese outbound tourists only started recently, after the Chinese opening policy and especially when Chinese government formerly permit the group package tour to foreign countries with the Approved Destination Status policy. While the Chinese outbound tourists have brought opportunities to destination counties, challenges and issues are also emerging both to the Chinese society and the destination societies. This study would like to present the historical development of Chinese outbound tourism, including the policies on Chinese outbound tourism, the patterns of Chinese outbound tourism and identified features of Chinese outbound tourism, based on the secondary data and literature. Yet the emphasis would be placed on the recent development and trend. This study argues that both more cooperation among the Chinese side and the destination countries are needed to enable a sustainable development through Chinese tourism activities. Finally, some of observations of Chinese tourists to Sri Lanka will also be discussed.