Chinese tourism unlikely to recover as domestic tourists tighten purse strings

Number of visitors increases but China's domestic tourism revenue declines

When planning a trip during the recent May Day holiday, recent college graduate Cai Zhishan wished he had enough money to rent a car for the 4,000km trip. In the end, he had to choose a budget travel method that was self-torturing.

New travel trends

This is an emerging travel trend in China, referring to tourists who do not have economic conditions but still want to travel. This group of tourists will visit the most places but at the lowest cost. They cut down on all basic needs to the maximum such as sleeping on trains instead of hotels and moving constantly, according to Reuters.

However, this way of traveling is casting a shadow over the post-pandemic recovery of China's domestic tourism market.

Cai, 22, took slow trains and buses from Hangzhou city to travel across Shanxi province. She also walked about 30,000 steps a day to visit scenic spots, temples and pagodas.

To save money, Cai chose to travel by night train so she didn’t have to rent a room or stay in a cheap motel. She only spent 2,500 yuan (about 8.3 million VND) for the 9-day trip.

Cai said she likes to travel even though she doesn't have much money. However, the female tourist admitted that spending frugally like this is "really tiring".

On social networking sites, the hashtag about this travel trend is spreading rapidly and has been updated by many people since before the May 1 holiday.

Cai also shared that he was inspired by posts about budget travel and was quite surprised by the savings ability of many travelers.

Domestic tourism affected

However, this trend is affecting the country's economic recovery. According to statistics from the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, this year's May Day holiday saw a boom in domestic tourism in China. People flocked to travel to make up for three years of the pandemic. Specifically, more than 274 million trips were made, up 19% compared to 2019.

However, total tourism spending only reached 148 billion yuan, the same as in 2019. It can be seen that the average spending on tourism activities has decreased from 603 yuan in 2019 to 540 yuan this year.

Alicia Garcia-Herrero, chief economist for Asia-Pacific at Natixis Bank, said that most Chinese people are not ready to spend as much as before the pandemic despite many government incentives.

People need new jobs with higher salaries to start spending more again, according to Herrero.

Not only people, a Chinese travel blogger also experienced spending the night in a public toilet to save money for a trip to Huangshan Mountain (Anhui Province).

"Sleeping overnight in the toilet was quite interesting. Although it was a bit difficult, I reduced my spending and spent it on traveling more to see beautiful scenery," this person shared.

However, this travel blogger considers increasing the budget to improve food and accommodation conditions.

However, not everyone can endure hardship and pursue this travel trend. Xing Zicong, 23, a Beijing resident, failed to save money on her trip to Xi’an to visit the Silk Road. The female tourist felt it was too difficult and had to spend more than expected after walking more than 10,000 steps.

According to Zing