On April 4, 2024, the first day of the Qingming holiday, Tianjin West Railway Station bustling with travelers. Photo: IC

China's cultural and tourism market is booming in April, with crowds of tourists going outskirts to appreciate blooming flowers and participate in outdoor activities like camping and city walks, while the supply of fresh tea and vegetables is also stimulating consumption. 

Analysts said on Monday that the sound development of the "spring economy" underscores the resilience and robust fundamentals of the Chinese economy, which will further unleash consumption in 2024.

Bookings for flower-viewing spots during the just-ended Qingming Festival holidays (from Thursday to Saturday) surged 391 percent year-on-year, with flower shows in regions including Luoyang, Central China's Henan Province and Wuyuan, East China's Jiangxi Province attracting large crowds, according to domestic travel platform Trip.com.

While viewing flowers, many people prefer to wear hanfu, a traditional style of dress of ethnic Han people. According to domestic online retail platform Meituan, searches for hanfu outfits during the three-day holiday increased by 230 percent year-on-year.

Spring is also a season to taste fresh food, with qingtuan (sweet green rice balls) and spring vegetables such as bamboo shoots and broad beans popular among Chinese consumers. Meituan's group-buying orders for spring-themed food in the first five days of April jumped 577 percent compared with the same period in March.

The "spring economy" is a window for understanding the status of China's economy. Large numbers of tourists, new consumption scenarios and booming goods and services consumption show that the Chinese economy is gaining momentum, Zhang Yi, CEO of iiMedia Research Institute, told the Global Times on Monday.

Zhang said that the economy still has great growth potential, calling for efforts to upgrade consumption. 

"On the supply side, the authorities can innovate consumption scenarios and products so as to meet consumers' diversified needs. In addition, the development of new quality productive forces will build a solid foundation for boosting consumption by upgrading the whole industrial and supply chains," he said.

In 2024, China is striving to boost domestic demand and support continuous economic growth, with the launch of a new round of large-scale equipment upgrades and trade-ins of consumer goods being the latest move. In the first two months, retail sales reached 8.13 trillion yuan ($1.12 trillion), up by 5.5 percent year-on-year, according to data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).

The NBS is set to publish China's first-quarter economic data next week.

Deng Haiqing, chief economist of AVIC Fund Management Co, told the Global Times on Monday that GDP growth may have reached about 5 percent in the first quarter.

In March, the manufacturing purchasing managers' index (PMI), non-manufacturing PMI and strategic emerging industries PMI all bounced back into expansion territory, debunking the "China collapse" hype, Deng said.

"Along with the sustained recovery of manufacturing, employment and personal incomes are expected to further improve. As a result, the consumption recovery will continue to be a major force driving economic growth," he said, and the economy will improve further in the second quarter amid stepped-up policies.

Deng said that the authorities are expected to provide policies to stabilize employment, especially for young people and college graduates, and increase personal incomes in a bid to expand domestic demand.

People showed strong enthusiasm for travel during the Qingming Festival holidays and the nation's consumption momentum continues to recover. Growth in the country's cultural and tourism market will continue in the upcoming May Day holidays, he said.