Tourists visit a popular tourism spot in Southwest China's Chongqing Municipality on April 16, 2023. As the five-day May Day holidays draw near, many places around China have entered a warming-up period with soaring tourist arrivals. The "hottest" travel season in five years is expected, with bookings rising as much as 200 percent from 2019, said online travel platforms. Photo: VCG

China's tourism sector is set to roar back for the upcoming May Day holidays in more than three years, which has been proved by an upsurge in bookings, with more than 240 million trips estimated by industry insiders.  

Consumption is set to further rebound amid the travel boom and estimated to contribute more than 120 billion yuan ($17.35 billion) in consumption, China Media Group reported. This May Day holidays mark the first long holiday in China after the Chinese New Year following the nation's declaration of a decisive victory in its COVID-19 response. 

As the world's second largest economy further recovers, experts foresee the strong momentum to sustain for the rest of 2023, enabled by the stepped-up policy support targeting to boost domestic consumption. 

Consumption boom 

The May Day holidays this year will fall on Saturday, lasting till May 3. China's railway systems will manage 120 million passenger trips from Thursday to May 4, an increase of 20 percent from 2019 and the highest level in history, data from China Railway showed on Thursday. Some 69.08 million train tickets have already been sold as of 8 am on Thursday. Around 53.3 million to 54.3 million vehicles are expected to travel through China's highway daily during the holidays. 

The search for domestic flights for the May Day holidays has surged more than 290 percent year-on-year and recovered 110 percent compared with 2019, while the search for accommodation exceeded over nine times compared with a year ago and jumped nearly 200 percent with 2019 as of April 20, according to a report shared with the Global Times by Chinese online travel service Trip.com.

Industry insiders have envisaged the holidays to fully sparkle as the "gold" in driving up consumption, indicating that the tourism sector has recovered to the same level as, and in some cases, beyond pre-epidemic period. They attributed the revival to China's non-stop efforts in boosting economic recovery. 

The tourism sector already started warming up even before the holidays, and the government's support for stimulating consumption and backing the real economy contribute to the rapid rebound of the sector, Cong Yi, a professor at the Tianjin University of Finance and Economics, told the Global Times.

In addition to the central government, Cong noted that local governments nationwide have been implementing measures tackling consumption recovery, which has helped to restore the market confidence on top of the nation's beyond-expectation economic performance in the first quarter. 

For instance, multiple cities and provinces in China have been issuing consumption vouchers. East China's Shandong Province released 528 million yuan worth of coupons, boosting consumption to 10.2 billion yuan, according to media reports. 

Amid the huge consumption potential, various shopping festivals and events will be arranged for the holidays. China's Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) along with the Foreign Ministry and other government agencies will organize an online shopping festival from Friday to May 12, focusing on promoting products from Central Asia and ASEAN members. 

Shu Jueting, MOFCOM spokesperson, said on Thursday that shopping events organized locally will inject more vitality during the holiday. 

On the other hand, Cong dedicated the revival for the bouncing back of the real economy as previously deployed stimulus will start showing effect in May, noting that the surging demand can be ensured by sufficient market supply. 

Industry insiders noted that short- or medium-distance family trips and leisure trips to rural areas and more niche destinations will be the major traveling pattern for the holiday, while data shared from major domestic travel agencies showed that outbound tours are also rebounding. 

For instance, Shanghai Spring Tour told the Global Times that the company has seen a significant growth in planned domestic trips in 2023 compared with the same period of 2019, and the orders of family trips accounting for 25 percent of their free-travel products. 

The order scale for rural tours on Trip.com for the upcoming holidays has recovered to 137 percent of the same period in 2019, while bookings for accommodation in rural areas on tujia.com accounted for nearly 40 percent of the platform's total orders, data from the companies showed. 

Niche destinations have been highly favorable by travelers in addition to the already trending cities like Qingdao, Chongqing, Beijing and Sanya along with other hot spots. The signature representation is Zibo in Shandong, a city that has recently garnered attention for its barbecue, and the bookings surged by 441 percent on Trip.com compared with the same period in 2019.

As for the outbound travel, the first travel peak in more than three years during the upcoming May Day holidays is expected. Search for outbound flights on Trip.com jumped to 120 percent of the level during the same period in 2019 before the pandemic, while searches for overseas hotels recovered to 70 percent. 

Zhang Yi, CEO of the iiMedia Research Institute, told the Global Times that the travel pattern will further elevate the consumption for matching products covering sectors from catering, accommodations to souvenirs, stressing the holiday as a crucial climax for the consumption boom in the first half of 2023 while paving the way for further recovery. 

Visitors take photos at Liziba Station, a tourist attraction that features a metro train passing through an apartment building, in Southwest China's Chongqing on April 25, 2023. The city is one of China's hottest tourist destinations for the coming five-day May Day holidays. Bookings have surpassed those of 2019 for hot travel destinations, and that's expected to generate huge revenues that will shore up the consumption recovery. Photo: VCG

Momentum injected 

Experts outlined the May Day holidays as a milestone timing, expecting the impetus to continuously power the upcoming quarters while the government support further taking effect. The rapid rebound of the nation's domestic demand will be a distinctive characteristic for this year's economic development. 

The consumption recovery during the holiday will become a significant pillar supporting the economic development for the rest of the year, bolstered by the blowout from the tourism sector and relevant industries, noted Pan Helin, the joint director of the Research Center for Digital Economics and Financial Innovation affiliated with Zhejiang University's International Business School. 

The booming demand will further feed through to the supply side and drive up the economy, Pan told the Global Times on Thursday.

Cong noted that domestic consumption and investment are anticipated to accelerate recovery in the second half of the year and further lift up the economic performance in the second quarter following the boom of the holiday. 

The data from the first quarter reflected the pessimism about domestic consumption in the past gradually subsided, and the growth rate for the second quarter is likely to remain considerable, said Cong, noting that the production and investment may further accelerate as targeted policy continues unfolding.

Cong stressed that China's rapid economic recovery could be an important supporter in the future to remove the fear of a global recession.

The nation, meanwhile, is facing challenges amid the rapid economic recovery as small- and medium- sized enterprises under the private economy still need time to restore production and build investment confidence, said Cong. To deal with that, responsible authorities have spared no effort to safeguard the hard-earned achievements by implementing targeted measures.