Chinese tourist affraid to travel in South Asia
Now it’s time for China to face the weight of complaints.
The year started well for Mai Thanh Trung, newly employed in a company to travel here that caters to groups of Chinese tourists. Mr Trung said he welcomed charter flights to mainland China regularly and pocketed an average monthly fee of about $ 600.
But then came May, when a Chinese public company stationed an oil rig near the coast of Vietnam in the center part of the South China Sea that both countries claim. Two days of anti-Chinese riots followed in southern and central Vietnam. And, according to hospitality professionals in this city of nearly a million of the Central Coast, the Chinese inbound tourism market crashed. more information here
Chinese tourists Complain
The complaints are familiar – they gape, they jostle, they avoid the local cuisine, and last year, 83 million Chinese mainland spent $ 102 billion abroad – Americans and Germans overruns – which makes biggest spenders of tourism in the world, according to the World tourism Organization.
Their numbers have their place among the most resentment tourists. Tourists from mainland China, often loaded with money and do not know the foreign means, collapse on the bus with apparently little appetite for breakfast buffet in the hotel and no concept of lining up.
Frustrations
Frustrations with the new tourists were summarized in a Thai online bulletin board last spring, when users posted complaints about Chinese tourists using voice outdoor inside and spitting in public, among other transgressions .
Zadig et Voltaire in Paris
Last year, Thierry Gillier, a French fashion designer who founded the label Zadig et Voltaire, caused a minor scandal when he told daily women that Chinese tourists would not be welcome at his new boutique Usage Paris. A barrage of international criticism persuaded him to apologize.
“For now it’s going back to the island of Hainan, but we do not know when it will come back,” he said of the platform, Chinese tourist are the future
Although at least four Chinese workers died in the riots, order was restored quickly. But China and other countries have issued notices citing potential risks to public safety in Vietnam. Tourism specialists said the Chinese board has led thousands of people to cancel trips, partly because it struck some travel insurance policies.
4.3 million foreign visitors to Vietnam
The Chinese make up about one quarter of the nearly 4.3 million foreign visitors to Vietnam in the first six months of 2014. But in June, arrivals from mainland China fell by about 30 percent and Hong Kong fell 72 percent compared to May.
“They became a little scared,” said Matthias Wiesmann, Director General of the Furama Resort Danang, one of the many beachfront properties in the city. Hotel has lost 10 percent to 15 percent of its business, approximately 2,800 nights in May and June, he said.
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Problem of Safety
Nguyen Xuan Binh, director of Da Nang by the government for the promotion of tourism, said the average occupancy rate in hotels seafront of the city was 60 percent to 70 percent at the end June, compared to the usual 80 percent to 90 percent. But Ken Atkinson, president of the working group of tourism in Vietnam Business Forum, a public-private consortium, has suggested that the rate was probably not more than 30 percent or 40 percent.
Mr. Binh said Da Nang is as safe as ever. He predicted that Chinese tourists return, but said he did not know when.
“They will come to Da Nang to see the reality,” he said.
Chinese tourists spent $ 102 billion on 83 million trips abroad in 2012, raising the country over Germany as the world’s top source of international tourism, according to the World Organization tourism.
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But tourists from China are often very sensitive to how they and their government are perceived abroad, while Chinese officials consider tourism to be closely linked to major diplomatic strategies, tourism experts said in interviews.
Japan
Japan, Chinese arrivals dropped in late 2012 and much of 2013, according to figures from the National Organization of Japanese tourism provided by the Institute for Research outgoing China Tourism in Heide, Germany. The slump was akin to a period of rising tensions between China and Japan over disputed in the East China Sea islands, said the director of the institute, Wolfgang Georg Arlt.
Malaysia
And Malaysia, 19.5 percent in the number of Chinese tourists arrived in April than in April 2013, according to government data. In contrast, the number fell to 0.10 percent in March and 3.6 percent in February and increased by nearly 25 percent in January from the previous year.
Brian King, a professor of tourism at the Polytechnic University of Hong Kong, said that several Chinese airlines have scaled back flights to Malaysia after the disappearance of flight 370 Malaysia Airlines on March 8, two thirds of whom were passengers Chinese. In addition, a Chinese tourist was kidnapped from a resort in Malaysia in April.
“The plans of Malaysia for the development of tourism in China are well off course for the moment,” said Mr. King. “Until more information about the flight, while likely continue to be the case . ”
He added that the flight Malaysia Airlines hit Ukraine would probably have a “very low” effect on tourism in Asia and the disaster could actually increase inbound Chinese tourism in Malaysia if the airline continued to reduce rates for attract customers.
Mr. Binh, the official tourism in Da Nang, said the growth in inbound Chinese tourism market of the city before May was mainly due to a sharp increase since 2012 charter flights operated by Vietnam Airlines, China Eastern Airlines and China Southern Airlines. He said Dragonair, a sister company of Cathay Pacific, was also open non-charter flights between Hong Kong and Da Nang.
A spokesman for the Crown corporations Vietnam Airlines declined to comment on the Chinese tourism crisis, saying in an email that the company was still “collection and evaluation of the” related information. China Eastern Airlines and China Southern Airlines did not respond to an email seeking comment.
Cathay Pacific and Dragonair canceled a total of 23 return flights between Hong Kong and three regular destinations Vietnam – Da Nang, Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City – between late May and late June, said Erica Peng, director of Vietnam Cathay Pacific countries. She added that airlines have operated normally 33 weekly flights from Hong Kong to these cities, seven Dragonair flights to Da Nang.
Mr. Binh, the Official Tourism, said that the “main engine” behind the Da Nang charter flights from China was the Crowne Plaza Danang, a large hotel on the seafront of the city. Four executives of the hotel on the central coast of his analysis echoes, saying the Crowne Plaza caters almost exclusively to Chinese tourist groups.
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One afternoon recently been, Zhang Lei, a Chinese businessman Henan Province, stood next to the swimming pool by the sea deserted courtyard of the Crowne Plaza. He said that apart from friends, he traveled with, he had not met other Chinese customers during his stay and that many Chinese did not move to Vietnam because of Sea dispute South China and riots plant in May.
“China has helped Vietnam so much over the years, but the Vietnamese have turned against us,” Mr. Zhang said, sipping a coconut.
Crowne Plaza employee, who declined to give his name because he was not authorized to speak to the news media, said Chinese were generally 70 to 80 percent of hotel guests. Emma Corcoran, a spokesman for the parent company of the hotel, InterContinental Hotels Group, declined a request for an interview with the CEO of the hotel.
Clarence Tan, Chief Operating Officer of the company for Asia and South East stations, said in an emailed statement that the recent Advisory tourism from China by the Chinese government, coupled with the reduction direct charter flights to Da Nang, has contributed to a decline in Chinese arrivals to Da Nang company properties.
Despite the decline in Chinese arrivals, Vietnam is still waiting to welcome 8.2 million international tourists this year, Nguyen Manh Cuong, Deputy Chairman of the National Tourism Agency, told reporters on July 9, a few days before the Chinese oil rig left the disputed area of the South China Sea. The total last year was almost 7.6 million, official figures show.
The start of the platform seems to have a greater confidence overall tourism in Vietnam, said Wiesmann, the Furama Resort Danang. He added that companies owned by the sea was almost back to normal by the end of July, due to upticks in, Japanese, South Korean and Vietnamese Australian customers.
Mr. Wiesmann said Chinese inbound tourism, but still slow, was improving “gradually”, even if we do not know when, or if, the market fully recover.
“It’s a little difficult to predict,” he said on CNN
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