U.S. Needs China for a Full Travel Recovery, Says Top Tourism Official

With the pandemic now over, what’s the future of tourism? What does the decline of full-time office employees mean for tourism and business travel? Why hasn’t U.S. solved its visa delay mess? We’ll discuss these topics with the executives of NYC Tourism+Conventions, U.S. Travel Association, Visit Britain, Intrepid Travel and others on-stage at the Skift Global Forum in New York on September 26-28. 

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

In just the past few days, there have been two key moves that ease restrictions for travel from China to the U.S. Tourism officials have been clear that the lifting of these restrictions is critical to a full recovery –though key hurdles remain. On Thursday, China lifted pandemic-era group tour restrictions for the U.S. and other key markets. Before the lift, Chinese travel agencies were banned from selling outbound group or package travel to the U.S.

The U.S. Travel Association has launched a website to highlight the negative impact of long visitor visa interview wait times—which now exceed an average of 400 days—is having on global travelers and U.S. businesses. Called USVisaDelays.com, the website lists stories of those affected, loss in industry spending, visitor wait times, impacted markets and a policy fact sheet. 

Multiple state tourism agencies ended their growing participation on the short-form video sharing platform TikTok to comply with their state executive orders. As they exit, they plan to move the resources allocated for TikTok into their other social media channels.

The U.S. travel industry will soon have an official voice at the highest levels of federal policymaking under the newly-created assistant secretary of travel and tourism. 

The absence of Chinese tourists as countries around the world opened their borders again remains the most impactful development this year. China’s commitment to zero Covid cases dashed the normalcy return hopes of the global tourism industry.

Both the Middle East and Europe are on track to reach their pre-pandemic levels in 2023 , according to the UN World Tourism Organization. Last year saw a stronger than expected recovery for the global tourism economy.

Rural and outdoor destinations are contending with slower growth rates compared to their pandemic boom as big cities become competitive again and Americans travel internationally. 

American embassies are working around the clock to bring down the amount of time international travelers have to wait to get a visitor visa interview in order to travel to the U.S., according to Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Visa Services Julie Stufft. The global median wait time for a B-1 or B-2 visa, also known as a visitor visa, has been reduced from 17 weeks in June to five weeks now. 

The U.S. travel sector needs to revamp its messaging around the sustainable action its destinations and businesses are taking in order to maintain competitiveness with European markets.

Travel search volume in the Asia Pacific region rose over 50 percent year over year in the fourth quarter last year, according to Expedia Group. The region’s strong performance led global travel search volume, which rose by 10 percent year over year.