Photo: Courtesy of China Eastern Airlines

China's domestic civil aviation market continues to pick up as summer tourism enters its peak season, with many airlines hitting new passenger highs following the introduction of products such as "Wild Your Weekends" packages. 

Amid the coronavirus pandemic, domestic airlines had stopped providing passengers with hot meals, offering only a bottle of water and snacks in a bid to reduce the risk of spreading the virus on airplanes.

Several airlines including China Eastern Airlines, Air China, China Southern Airlines, Juneyao Airlines and Hainan Airlines have now resumed providing hot meals to passengers.

On Sunday, China Eastern Airlines resumed offering hot meals on domestic flights with a flying time of more than 91 minutes, excluding those to Xinjiang and Dalian, where recent coronavirus outbreaks have occurred.

China Eastern said in August, its fleet of aircraft was making more the 2,400 flights a day, which was over 95 percent of pre-pandemic levels, with special packages such as "Wild Your Weekends," pumping up passenger levels. 

Air China said that it will also serve hot food on domestic flights in August. Flights between Beijing, Shanghai, Tianjin, Chengdu, Hangzhou, Chongqing, and Wuhan will be the first to resume hot food service, with other domestic flights following. 

Passengers flying with China Southern Airlines and Hainan Airlines have enjoyed hot meals since July.