Mauritius Sees China Reopening as Boon for Tourism Recovery

Scott Pauli. (Photo Credit: Island of Hawai‘i Visitors Bureau)

Travels and Textiles in Central Asia Textiles expert Chris Aslan explores a crossroads of history where ‘fortunes were made and lost through shimmering silks, life-giving felts and gossamer cottons’. Most travellers know of the Silk Road, but older still are the Wool Road and Cotton Road, whose tightly woven stories Aslan seeks to untangle. 

Destination DC will spend nearly $20 million on marketing in an upcoming advertising campaign as the city deals with a slow travel recovery.

China’s three largest airlines remained in the red in the second quarter, although losses narrowed significantly from the previous three months as a recovery in the domestic aviation market gathered pace.

ITB China, the marketplace for China’s travel industry, is thrilled to announce its collaboration with Trip.com Group, the leading global travel service provider for this year’s highly anticipated event, taking place from 12 – 14 September 2023 in Shanghai.

Comments on taking holidays at Guiyang in midsummer went viral on the social media. Many a visitor posted photos and recommended different routes of travel, including easily-encountered waterfalls, vast cloud sea and serene countryside. Reputed by its cool climate and quality ecology, the “Cool Guiyang” becomes the ideal travel destination for summer. According to Ctrip, tourism orders of Guiyang have increased by 70% YoY since July. In recent years, driven by economic development, people’s preference on travel has evolved from a fine ecology and climate to cultural experience and spiritual enjoyment. The National Summer Tourism Development Report recently issued by China Tourism Academy pointed out that, under the combined influence of the development of the aging society, the increase in the size of middle class and the in-depth implementation of Healthy China strategy, the volume of summer tourism and related markets has reached 1.2 to 1.5 trillion RMB .

The Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan is to halve the $200 daily fee it charges tourists in an effort to boost a sector still struggling to recover a year after the end of Covid-19 restrictions.

A full recovery in airline passenger volumes in Europe has been pushed back to 2025 from 2024, the body representing European airports said on Tuesday, revising the industry’s optimistic tone about its post-Covid recovery.

Chinese airlines will be the early winners of the country’s international reopening, analysts say, having kept most widebody planes and staff ready while foreign carriers struggle with capacity constraints after previous border openings.

China has told travel agencies in Japan that it has stopped issuing new visas for travel, three companies confirmed to Reuters on Tuesday, an apparent response to stricter measures for Chinese arrivals after their country freed up travel.

U.S. and European airlines will benefit from pent-up demand for travel to China after its recent border reopening, but route approvals, fresh Covid-19 testing rules and not enough large aircraft remain barriers to rising sales, analysts and industry officials say.

Ethiopia’s tourism sector has been hit hard in the last two years by Covid and a brutal civil war, with spending down by more than $2 billion. The tourist sites and infrastructure have been spared, but the sector doesn’t have the confidence of governments, travelers and tour group operators that the conflict is over and the country is a safe destination.