Dai Bin | High-quality development is the main theme for the revitalization of the tourism industry

Recently, Director Dai Bin wrote an article under his own name, titled "High-Quality Development is the Main Theme for the Revitalization of Tourism", which was published in the journal "People's Forum" in August 2020 (Volume 1). The full text is reproduced below:

High-quality development is the main theme for the revitalization of the tourism industry. Dai Bin [1] (China Tourism Academy, Beijing, 100005)

[Abstract] The impact of the COVID-19 on tourism can be divided into three stages: overall stagnation, orderly resumption of work and post epidemic revitalization. The post epidemic revitalization policy must focus on breaking the "trap of the primary stage of mass tourism" and steadily promote the high-quality development of the tourism industry. We will focus on building new spaces for sharing a better life between hosts and guests, deepen the integration of culture, technology, and tourism, enhance the competitiveness of tourism market entities, and promote the modernization of the tourism governance system and governance capacity. Key words: COVID-19; Revitalization of tourism industry; High quality development; Host guest sharing; Cultural Tourism Integration [Chinese Library Classification No.] F590 [Document Identification Code] A The COVID-19 since the Spring Festival has evolved into a "black swan" in the global tourism industry, and has also pressed the pause button for China's tourism industry, which continues to grow at a high speed. If the epidemic ends at the end of May to mid June and the tourism market can fully recover, the epidemic will significantly affect the tourism economy in the first half of the year. It is expected that the number of domestic tourists will experience negative growth of 56% and 15.5% respectively in the first quarter and the whole year of 2020, with a decrease of 932 million compared to the previous year; Domestic tourism revenue experienced negative growth of 69% and 20.6% respectively, with a decrease of approximately 1.18 trillion yuan compared to the previous year. The number of inbound tourists and international tourism revenue experienced negative growth of 51.7% and 59.8%, 34.7% and 40.6% respectively, with a decrease of 50.32 million and 53.4 billion US dollars respectively compared to the previous year. The number of outbound tourists decreased by 42.6% and 17.6% respectively, with a decrease of 276.3 billion people compared to the previous year. With the joint efforts of tourism authorities at all levels and the tourism front, the tourism industry has shifted from complete stagnation to orderly resumption of work, and policies and strategies for post epidemic revitalization are being planned. The tourism industry in the post pandemic era is not simply going back to the past, but requires new thinking, new momentum, and new models. Firstly, reflection during the pandemic: the traditional tourism development model is the biggest crisis. The development of the tourism industry has never been smooth sailing, as external environmental impacts and influences always exist. Before the epidemic, the industry had already shown a phenomenon of "macro reporting good news, micro reporting bad news". While tourism consumption is flourishing and the tourism market is growing rapidly, most travel service providers, tourist attractions, and tourism accommodation industries have been operating at a low profit or even loss for a long time. In the case of weak endogenous driving force in the market, relying solely on national support policies, the tourism industry cannot achieve the goal of post epidemic revitalization. one The binary segmentation of the consumption market between foreign tourists and local residents limits the development space of the tourism industry. People's understanding of contemporary tourism industry began with group tourism, and for a long time, groups have also been the mainstream way for tourists to travel, leading to the long-term limitation of government and industry's understanding of the tourism market by group tourism. In the past, it was foreigners, overseas Chinese, Hong Kong and Macao compatriots, and Taiwan compatriots who visited that were tourists. Later on, domestic and outbound tourism emerged, and citizens who participated in group tours and took routes also became tourists. In fact, individual travelers, rather than group tourists, are the mainstream of today's tourism market. In the domestic tourism market of over 6 billion people per year, the share of group tourists received by travel agencies in the domestic tourism market is less than 4%, while outbound group tours are higher but also less than 40%. Today's tourists have moved from narrow scenic spots to the daily living spaces of residents in a wide range of destinations. The integration of out of town tourism and local residents' leisure has brought more abundant market space to the tourism industry. According to the "Tourism Survey and Statistics System", the domestic tourism market size of 6 billion people is estimated, and the per capita travel time is about 7.65 days. On average to every day, and then to every province, city, and county, this data is very small. Compared to local lifestyle consumption such as dining, shopping, culture, entertainment, and leisure, the frequency is even lower. If we continue to view the tourism economy from the perspective of traditional travel agencies, using the narrow mindset of group sightseeing tours to enter the market, and allowing 38000 travel agencies, 20000 tourist attractions, and tens of thousands of tourist accommodation institutions to compete in such a narrow market, even without the pandemic, the tourism industry will still face numerous crises. With the growth of tourism consumption and the expansion of industry boundaries, the tourism industry needs to break through its self imposed limitations on market awareness and make the market foundation more solid. two The resource driven development model has led to a long-term lack of renewal in the momentum of tourism development, thanks to the policy dividends and demographic dividends of reform and opening up. Influenced by the group tour operation model, the model of "a sea of people eating dividends and collecting tickets for mountains and rivers" has been effective in the industry for a long time. In the era of scattered and personalized demand, this resource dependence and spontaneous growth model can no longer continue to lead the development of the industry, and also hinder the updating of industrial development momentum and enterprise research and development mechanisms. Influenced by inbound tourism in the 1980s, it is widely believed that the tourism industry is a "forever sunrise industry" that requires less investment, yields quick results, and can even sustain development without investment. Trapped in a path dependence on resource development in the development model, always staring at the limited resources left by our ancestors and the heavens. The collection of information, ticketing reservations, non local experiences, small transportation in the source area, commercial forms such as airports and highways that are used as transit and distribution centers have long been isolated from the perspective of the tourism industry. During this epidemic, except for a few tourism groups such as Hong Kong China Travel Service, Overseas Chinese Town, Ctrip, Lingnan, Jinjiang, and Kaiyuan, which have good capital reserves and bank credit, the cash flow of most small and medium-sized tourism enterprises quickly became tight. In the past three decades, whenever there are political turmoil, economic depression, earthquake and tsunami, "SARS", "COVID-19" and other crisis events, the tourism industry will have a passive situation of neither endogenous kinetic energy reserves nor external industrial coordination. The reason for this is that the organic composition of capital in the tourism industry has long been lower than the average level of various industries in the national economy, and the speed of technological progress in transforming business models is relatively slow. It is superficially related to fields such as culture, education, technology, finance, industry, and agriculture, but lacks deep integration. Market entities can only resonate with the demand side on the same frequency by constantly expanding their horizons, adhering to an open resource view and an integrated industry view. The destination construction concept of "government led, moderately advanced" cannot adapt to the current development situation of tourism economy. For many years, the central and local tourism development models of "government led, moderately advanced" mainly focus on the construction of tourism destinations rather than the development of tourism economy. The main policy objectives are the number of tourists, total consumption, and the contribution rate of tourism to economic growth and social employment. Policy tools are limited to investment in basic construction projects. For a long time, the updating of national tourism concepts, the protection of tourism rights, and the innovation of external publicity and promotion have lagged behind. In addition, the sharing system of transit, distribution, and connection, as well as the imperfect public services, have made it difficult for the tourism industry to form a self-healing function to cope with crises. With the diversification of market entities, the proportion of directly affiliated units and state-owned enterprises is becoming smaller and smaller. Relying solely on the traditional administrative led development model, leadership instructions, government documents, and meetings and events, cannot cultivate a truly market dynamic tourism industry system. Whether it is industrial upgrading or service innovation, both rely on technology for the digital transformation of tourism enterprises. However, tourism market entities mainly composed of small and medium-sized enterprises are unable to bear the huge infrastructure costs. In addition to measures such as quality guarantee deposits from travel agencies, tourist attractions, and tourist resorts, the tourism regulatory authorities still lack effective policy tools and have weak guidance and coordination with comprehensive departments. The central tourism regulatory authorities need to further strengthen their foresight, initiative, and authority in guiding local governments to respond to tourism crises and revitalize the market, including the construction of emergency command platforms, professional talent teams, information collection, data production, and situation analysis. four The outdated tourism discourse system cannot support the status of a major tourism country. The "golden decade" of inbound tourism in the 1980s was not due to how well our market promotion and marketing were done, how well-equipped our infrastructure such as airports, railways, and highways were, or how high-quality our service interfaces such as hotels, scenic spots, travel agencies, and tour guides were. Instead, we benefited from the "dividend of openness". The emerging and continuously growing outbound tourism market at the beginning of this century is also a result of economic and social development. Over the years, although bilateral and multilateral international tourism cooperation has set up platforms and mechanisms such as the Tourism Year, the China Japan South Korea Tourism Ministers' Meeting, the China US Tourism Summit Dialogue, and has had more opportunities to speak in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, the the Belt and Road Summit Forum, the Asian Civilization Dialogue, etc., and despite the achievements in two-way "free travel" and "Macao World Tourism and Leisure Center" in tourism exchanges and cooperation between Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan, there is still much room for improvement in national tourism image construction, professional promotion, improvement of international tourism environment, and quality improvement. In 2019, China's inbound tourism entered a stable and rebounding channel, with a comprehensive satisfaction index of 83.5 tourists, a year-on-year increase of 4.2%. The economic and social development achievements that carry the "Chinese Dream" and the beautiful life of contemporary urban and rural residents are becoming new driving forces for the development of inbound tourism. LETS, HiChina Travel and other inbound tourism entrepreneurial teams rely on food, intangible cultural heritage and other living resources to develop unique new projects and routes, allowing inbound tourists to experience a more authentic China. How to guide the spontaneous growth of the outbound tourism market, protect the life and property safety of outbound tourists overseas, and promote the international growth of tourism enterprises and other strategic issues also need to be further researched and practically promoted. 2、 Outlook after the epidemic: The tourism market is still there, and the development momentum has changed. The epidemic will eventually pass, and the tourism industry will eventually revive. However, the traditional tourism development model and its corresponding tourism development theory, as well as resource planning, development momentum, and organizational methods, are likely to be gone forever. 1. The demand for tourism has not disappeared, but it cannot simply go back to the past. The "2020 Post Epidemic Tourism Big Data Research Report" released by the China Tourism Research Institute and Ctrip Tourism Big Data Joint Laboratory shows that 40% of respondents often pay attention to tourism and promotional information, and 43% of people said that if the epidemic ends, they will choose to travel in the first half of the year. It is expected that there may be a peak in tourism during the May Day holiday. This indicates that tourism demand has not disappeared due to the pandemic, but has been delayed. Even during the most severe period of the epidemic, open spaces and urban parks such as the Summer Palace in Beijing have not interrupted local leisure tourists. As for non tourism group tourists such as visiting relatives and friends, and business trips, they have always existed. According to comprehensive calculations by the China Tourism Research Institute (Data Center of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism), during the seven days leading up to the Spring Festival holiday (New Year's Eve to the sixth day of the lunar new year), the country received 248 million domestic tourists, a year-on-year decrease of 40.3%; Realize domestic tourism revenue of 278.1 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 45.9%. During the ten day Spring Festival holiday (from New Year's Eve to the ninth day of the lunar new year), a total of 261 million domestic tourists were received nationwide, achieving a domestic tourism revenue of 284.4 billion yuan. The number of tourists and income have significantly decreased. As long as the people have needs, the market has a foundation, and the local government has motivation, the post epidemic revitalization of the tourism market is a matter of time. These data are the source of confidence in the post epidemic tourism market revitalization, but also the source of concern for sustainable development: seeing the tourism consumption during the May Day holiday, summer vacation, National Day, Spring Festival and other days, thinking that we can return to the past pattern and days, there is no major crisis, that is, the strategic crisis of cyclical adjustment is waiting not far away. The revitalization of the domestic tourism market is the primary task of the current tourism epidemic, but it should not and must not simply go back to the past. The recovery of the tourism market, the revitalization of the tourism industry, and the revitalization of specific tourism enterprises are interrelated, but they are not the same thing. Local governments, in order to revitalize the tourism market, may temporarily reduce or waive scenic spot tickets within a certain range, which is beneficial for establishing market image and boosting consumer confidence, but it cannot become a standard policy. The pace of the administrative department should consider the market pace of the resuming enterprises, as well as the possible irrational price competition, and should rationally assist the transformation and upgrading of scenic spots and high-quality development. The competition of future tourism destinations is a competition of local economic and social development level and comprehensive strength, rather than a competition of traditional natural resources and historical relics. If local governments, especially tourism authorities, continue to focus on the data of A-level scenic spots and star rated hotels and become complacent, it is impossible to understand why Shanghai, Suzhou, Hangzhou, Xiamen, Guangzhou, Shenzhen and other places far exceed those seemingly resource rich comprehensive tourism demonstration zones in the central and western regions in terms of tourism reception, tourism revenue, overall productivity of tourism enterprises, entrepreneurial innovation activity, tourist satisfaction and other development indicators. two The fragmented consumer demand and diverse tourism market are forming an unprecedentedly complex tourism consumption. New demands are accumulating, and residents' leisure and business travel are beginning to merge with sightseeing tourism to form a new contemporary tourism market. If the tourism industry seizes this strategic opportunity and fully intervenes in the overall pattern of residents' lives, national economy, and social development, it will enter a new blue ocean. If this once-in-a-decade opportunity is allowed to pass by the tourism industry, it may be difficult to escape the "primary stage trap of mass tourism" like falling into the middle-income trap, that is, "low-frequency consumption - low price competition - low-quality supply - low tourist satisfaction - even lower frequency consumption", especially for products and services with strong homogenization and extremely low service quality, the risk of being abandoned and replaced is greater. When tourism becomes a way of life, we should not only pay attention to the lives of tourists in other places, but also to the leisure life of local people. These two cannot be separated and are actually accelerating their integration. Local life has quality and tone, and foreign tourists are willing to share it. Tourist attractions, theme parks, amusement parks, resort hotels, and tourism complexes with living scenes and quality experiences will attract high-frequency consumption from locals. Above the landscape is life, ordinary life comes naturally, and the vast world is the warmest. Think about it, which country, region, or city that can attract tourists from afar to visit repeatedly can be built into a world-class tourist destination solely based on natural scenery and check-in symbols? How to integrate relatively low-frequency tourism and relatively high-frequency local leisure into a balanced travel service model and destination construction may be the entry point for improving the risk resistance ability of market entities and the starting point for administrative entities to lead destination construction. There is a saying in the industry that the revenue of American Express alone is the total revenue of travel agencies in China, and Japan Transport Corporation (JTB) is the only travel agency group in the world to enter the Fortune 500. The obvious fact behind this is that American Express started with traveler's checks, and its core competitiveness lies in financial services related to tourism and travel; JTB is a diversified travel and lifestyle service provider, selling beer coupons and movie tickets to urban and rural residents within its business scope. In recent years, online travel service providers such as Ctrip have begun to penetrate offline and extend to business travel and local life. Meituan Dianping, on the other hand, carries a huge amount of traffic to serve local residents' lives and has turned to the travel service market. There are also plans such as Pinduoduo and JD's "Cloud Cabin", as well as tourism companies such as Jingyu Donkey Mama and Peak Intelligence entering the local specialty product display and sales market during the epidemic, all of which are noteworthy trends. This means that the era of mixed operation of travel services is coming, and typical industries such as tourism accommodation, tourist attractions, and theme parks are also beginning to shift from a single form to a complex lifestyle scenario. For specific enterprises, this is the trend oriented strategic crisis. three Technology and culture are replacing traditional resources and becoming the driving force for the development of the tourism industry. Technology, culture, fashion, education, and entrepreneurship are changing the economic organization and social development mode, and injecting new momentum into the tourism industry. Is tourism a modern service industry, a productive service industry or a lifestyle service industry? This issue should not and does not need further discussion. In 2009, the State Council issued the "Opinions on Accelerating the Development of Tourism Industry" (to be verified), which clearly defined the positioning of tourism industry in the national strategic system, namely: the strategic pillar industry of the national economy and the modern service industry that satisfies the people more. This position has been continuously strengthened in government documents and industrial practices over the past decade, and the modern service industry attributes of tourism, which combine productivity and lifestyle, have become increasingly evident. The strategic thinking and systematic application of contemporary technology and cultural creativity by large tourism groups such as American Express, Japan's JTB, and Europe's TUI, as well as the involvement of fashion brands such as Bulgari and MUJI in high-end and light luxury hotels, all clearly and unequivocally tell us that tradition is disappearing, and the future is here. In 1841, the establishment of Thomas Cook Travel Agency pioneered the modern tourism industry. Since then, travel agencies have been the "leader" and most representative format of the tourism industry. The tour guide is the leader of the service interface. "Whether the mountains and rivers of our country are beautiful or not depends entirely on the tour guide's words. However, this iconic world-class century old store went bankrupt last year. Over the past 180 years, entrepreneurs and inheritors have been working hard and maintaining the company's leadership position in the industry. Just like the Shanxi ticket office, Kodak film, and Nokia phone in the past, the collapse of Thomas Cook was the result of traditional travel agency management being unable to adapt to the changes and cyclical challenges of the times. Faced with the fragmented demands of individual tourists and the dispersed supply integrated into the daily lives of urban and rural residents, traditional manual operation models and historical experience cannot tell the answer to the future of the tourism industry. The increasingly integrated 5G, artificial intelligence, big data, autonomous driving, machine translation, and contactless services into daily life have fundamentally disrupted traditional tourism consumption patterns, and the next step will inevitably overturn traditional tourism service methods. Only with the wings of technology and humanities can the tourism industry cope with the cyclical or strategic crises of the next decade. four The development model and governance capacity of local tourism are facing greater pressure. If the market entities driven by demand have already taken the lead in industrial innovation, can the government and public sectors continue to use the traditional "government led, moderately advanced" development model? The answer is clearly negative. Compared to forty years ago, there have been significant changes in the foundation of the tourism market, the driving force of the industry, and the governance capacity of the national governance system. During the early stage of reform and opening up, the government had almost all the resources needed for tourism development, including funds, talents, projects, information, and policies. Except for the three major state-owned travel agencies of China National Travel Service, China Travel Service, and China Youth Travel Service, as well as state-owned enterprises and institutions such as government reception hotels and scenic spots, there were almost no private and socialized market entities. Today, private and foreign enterprises account for more than half of the tourism enterprises, and innovative formats such as online travel agents, economy hotels, theme parks, and low-cost airlines are emerging. Human resources are also showing a "two highs and one low" trend of high education, high level, and low age. Mobile Internet and big data further weakened the information asymmetry between the government and the market, and the marginal effect of policies such as holiday system adjustment and standard promotion began to decline. The implementation of the concept of governing the country by law and the promotion of the rule of law process, as well as the improvement of industry associations, have made the interaction between market entities and the government more rational, standardized, and transparent. Fully leveraging the decisive role of the market in resource allocation and better playing the role of the government "is a requirement for adhering to the socialist basic economic system, promoting high-quality economic development, and improving the modernization of the governance system and governance capacity of the Party and the state in the tourism field. It is necessary to establish and improve the monitoring and operation of tourism economy based on big data