Pulse on China's Economy: China’s Golden Week holidays conclude with robust tourism, consumption
China's eight-day Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day holidays wrapped up on Friday, with the number of domestic trips and tourism revenue seeing robust growth and exceeding that of 2019, underscoring the robust recovery of the world's second-largest economy.
The bustling scenes seen across the country during the Golden Week holidays offered the latest sign of strong vitality in China's consumption, a major economic growth driver, and the vast potential of China's steady economic recovery, in stark contrast to the dire predictions made by Western media and politicians, analysts said.
While downward pressure remains, China's economy will continue to rebound in the rest of the year and could make a full recovery at the end of 2023, thanks to robust recovery in consumption and other areas and a range of policy measures taken to boost growth, analysts noted.
Bustling tourism
A total of 826 million domestic passenger trips were made in China during the eight-day Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day holidays, a year-on-year increase of 71.3 percent and up 4.1 percent from 2019. Holiday tourism generated 753.43 billion yuan ($104.68 billion), up 129.5 percent year-on-year and 1.5 percent increase from 2019, official data from the Ministry of Culture and Tourism showed on Friday.
Some 59.89 million trips were expected to be made on Friday during the return peak, a year-on-year increase of 58.4 percent, data from the Ministry of Transport showed on Friday. Among them, a total of 18.8 million passengers will travel via the railway with 12,571 trains to be operated, according to China Railway.
Domestic consumption experienced a strong pickup during the holidays, showing the best performance since 2019. For instance, the average daily consumption scale of service retail jumped by 153 percent compared with the same period of 2019, while the consumption scale for dine-in surged by 254 percent, according to data from China's e-commerce platform Meituan.
Multiple provincial-level regions rolled out their tourism reports for the holidays on Friday and Thursday, which returned to or even exceeded the 2019 level.
Shanghai welcomed a total of 21.30 million tourists for the holidays with transactions related to tourism recording a year-on-year increase of 29.7 percent to 29.24 billion yuan, official data showed on Friday.
The Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region received a total of 14.53 million domestic tourists in the first five days of the holidays, a yearly increase of 5.38 times and 1.29 times more than the same period in 2019, thepaper.cn reported on Thursday. The region generated a total of 9.93 billion yuan in tourism revenue, a year-on-year increase of 6.31 times and 1.12 times increase compared with 2019.
Chinese tourists were able to experience the holidays in diverse forms, from touring domestic and international scenic spots and enjoying leisure time in third- and fourth-tier cities to becoming involved in emerging experiences such as cultural and tourism integration projects, night markets, and musicals, according to reports from Chinese travel agencies.
Flight bookings for top domestic destinations during the holidays surged by nearly five times compared to before the COVID-19 pandemic, with bookings for flights departing on September 29 - the first day of the holidays - hitting a record high on Chinese online travel agency platform Qunar, the company told the Global Times on Friday. Bookings for domestic hotels in popular destinations doubled compared with the pre-COVID period. The top destinations included Beijing, Chengdu, Chongqing, Shanghai and other cities.
In addition to visiting well-known cities and metropolises, some Chinese travelers also opted to enjoy the nation's rich cultural heritage and breathtaking natural scenery.
A female traveler surnamed Zhao from Southwest China's Chongqing visited the Bingling Temple Grottoes in Northwest China's Gansu Province -a world cultural heritage with a history stretching back more than 1,600 years. Zhao told the Global Times on Friday that she also encountered some foreign visitors during her visit.
Meanwhile, the ongoing 19th Asian Games in Hangzhou, East China's Zhejiang Province, sparked a consumption craze in sports and related fields throughout the holidays. The order volume for service consumption within the province exceeded 195 percent this year compared with 2019, while the dine-in order volume in Hangzhou increased by 443 percent and orders related to sports and fitness increased by 762 percent, per media reports.
At the same time, outbound tourism witnessed a strong rebound for the recently passed holidays. Orders for overseas travel on Chinese online tourism platform Ctrip.com increased by more than eight times year-on-year, according to a report sent to the Global Times on Friday. Meanwhile, bookings for international flights for the holidays on Fliggy reached a peak within the year.
The boom in tourism also spurred a consumption craze. In the first seven days of the holidays, sales of key monitored retail and dining enterprises increased by 9 percent year-on-year, while the major passenger flow in key commercial areas in 36 cities increased by 164 percent year-on-year, data from the Ministry of Commerce showed on Friday. The domestic box office also topped 2.5 billion yuan, a yearly increase of 70 percent.
Experts attributed the rebound in consumption to China's steady economic recovery and effective macroeconomic stimulus policies, showing the nation's strong resilience and huge potential in consumption, which will also play a vital role in bolstering economic growth in the fourth quarter.
Boosting GDP growth
China's economic performance outperformed 2019 in some aspects after nearly one year of post-epidemic growth, shown by the consumption rebound for the holidays and gradual recovery in trade along with other indicators, Cao Heping, an economist at Peking University, told the Global Times on Friday, expecting a full recovery by the end of 2023 or at the latest by February next year.
China's official manufacturing purchasing managers' index for September came in at 50.2, its first time in positive territory since April and after a consecutive increase over the last four months, the National Bureau of Statistics announced on September 30.
The consumption boom reflected the strong resilience and driving force of the spending power of Chinese residents, Zhang Yi, CEO of iiMedia Research Institute, told the Global Times on Friday.
Cong Yi, a professor at the Tianjin University of Finance and Economics, echoed Zhang's view and added that the targeted policy measures had further noticeable effects during the Golden Week, stressing the importance of continuing to implement the policies moving froward.
Cong told the Global Times on Friday that the consumption rebound during the holidays reflected China's huge consumption potential while also serving as a significant factor to further shore up market confidence and bolster domestic demand.
This confidence will play a vital role in promoting continuous economic growth while also elevating supply, Cong noted.
Zhang expected the consumption momentum to become an indispensable engine for advancing the economy, as the fourth quarter is also a peak season for domestic consumption, with major consumption events like the Double 11 online shopping festival.
In response to the bearish outlook on the Chinese economy painted by some Western media outlets and politicians, experts said China's consumer market is showing strong recovery and growth signs despite downward pressure with its strong market potential, resilience and confidence.
Cong noted that China maintains its market confidence as the world's second-largest consumption market, especially amid the process of rapid structural upgrading. He also stressed the importance of stepping up efforts in sectors such as infrastructure investment and support for the private economy to ignite market dynamics.
China's economic development should be the least worrying one during the global economic recovery process, Cong said.