Domestic tourism demand in China’s urban centres: Empirical analyses and marketing implications

Abstract

China’s domestic tourism market makes up more than 90 per cent of the country’s tourist traffic, and contributes more than 70 per cent of total tourism receipts. This study proposed a demand model that examined the relationship between the annual expenditure of urban domestic travellers and per capita GDP. It was found that the demand theory developed in market economies was applicaable in a transit economy like China. Income elasticity of domestic tourism in China’s urban areas was determined to be 0.30. The model also recognised the positive effect of the country’s special economic zones on the domestic demand. Underlying reasons for the study’s findings are discussed. The model can be used to forecast domestic demand from Chinese urban centres. Implications of the study include the suggestion that the demand measurement of expenditure is more appropriate than person trips in the Chinese context and from the perspective of destination marketing.

Tourism development of World Heritage Sites in China: A geographic perspective

“…The number of urban residents is considered equivalent to the number of tourists generated from a city, as urban residents contribute significantly to the growth of China's domestic tourism (Cai et al, 2001;Wu & Cai, 2006). According to China's Tourism Statistics Yearbook (China National Tourism Administration (CNTA), 2001), in 2000 there was an average of 1.005 domestic trips per urban resident, as compared to that of only 0.557 per non-urban resident.…”

“…First, China has made a transition from being centrally planned to a market-based economy. Second, increased leisure time and disposable income has expedited the growth of domestic tourism (Cai, Hu, & Feng, 2001;Cai & Knutson, 1998). Lastly, higher education is creating greater interest in sites significant to China's heritage (Light, Prentice, Ashworth, & Larkham, 1994;Yan, Morrison, & Zhang, 2006).…”

Tourism Demand Modeling and Forecasting: A Review of Literature Related to Greater China

“…Although both domestic tourism and outbound tourism have developed fast in Mainland China in recent years, only two studies (Cai and Knutson, 1998;Cai et al, 2002) investigated the domestic tourism and one (Qu and Lam, 1997) examined outbound tourism to Hong Kong. Song and Witt (2006) is the only study that examined tourism demand in Macau.…”

‘Sho’t left’: Changing domestic tourism in South Africa

“…Here, the accompanying rapid growth of domestic leisure markets, have been "clearly sizeable" (Ghimire and Li, 2001: 104). The post-1990s forces that have galvanised the enormous expansion of domestic tourism in China, the patterns and current tends of tourism flows, local impacts and national government policy initiatives towards the domestic tourism industry are several of the key threads in an expanding corpus of research and writings concerning the country's burgeoning domestic tourism economy (Wen, 1997;Xu, 1998Xu, , 1999Wu et al, 2000;Cai et al, 2001;Ghimire and Li, 2001;Aramberri and Xie, 2003;Gu and Liu, 2004;Xie and Xu, 2004;Walsh and Swain, 2004;Wang, 2004;Wang and Qu, 2004).…”