China Yangtze Three Gorges International Tourism Festival, China International Folk Art Festival and China Yichang Yangtze Piano Music Festival (shortened as the Three Festivals) are coming to Yichang in September. We are looking forward to the grand opening on September 16.
These three national-level festivals echo with the plan of Yichang Municipal Party Committee and Yichang Municipal Government to develop Yichang’s cultural tourism industry into an industry with the output value of hundreds of billions RMB and it will drive the newly started project forging ahead.
According to the plan, the gross output value of Yichang cultural tourism industry will break through 100 billion RMB by 2016. Liu Bing, Director of Yichang Tourism Bureau, said that the superposition of both the international and domestic markets, the transformation from tourism city to city tourism as well as the comprehensive development from small tourism to big tourism have brought a golden opportunity for Yichang’s cultural tourism industry to move forward to an industry with the output value of hundreds of billions RMB in Yichang.
Building Up Core Competitiveness of Tourism Products Through Exquisite ConstructionIn the Three Gorges Folk Custom Tourist Site, a unique path paved with 1000 mahogany winds its way in the mountains. Liu Jingpeng, a visitor from Shanghai said in wonder: “I have visited many scenic spots at home and abroad, but I’ve never seen such high-ranking wooden path before.”
In this Scenic Spot, such special attractions can be seen everywhere such as the stone pass, the stilted building, the old trenches and so on.
For these specialties, the Three Gorges Folk Custom Tourist Site adheres to the standard of China’s best and world-class. Over 0.8 billion RMB has been invested to upgrade the hardware of the scenic spot. It takes only seven years to develop itself into a National 5A Tourist Attraction. In the first half of this year, the number of tourists increased by 30%.
This is just a microcosm of Yichang tourism. In the past five years, Yichang has strongly promoted the exquisite construction of scenic spots. The total investment of the tourism infrastructure projects has amounted over 20 billion RMB, with the average annual growth of more than 30%. By 2016, the number of cultural tourism projects with the investment above 100 million RMB will reach 100; the amount of investment will exceed 80 billion RMB.
The Three Gorges Dam, the Three Gorges Folk Custom Tourist Site, the Qingjiang Gallery, the Three Gorges Waterfall, the Yuquan Scenic Spot and other important tourism projects in Western Hubei have been completed in succession.
Experts call Yichang the“Window of China”for its rich tourism resources.
The abundant tourism resources have gradually been constructed into tourism products with core competitiveness. At present, Yichang together with Suzhou, Luoyang and Guilin rank the top in the Prefectural 5A Tourist Attractions in China. Now there are 27 tourist attractions which are above 3A level, among which, three are 5A Tourist Attractions ranking the first in Hubei Province (There are seven 5A Tourist Attractions in Hubei Province).
Building Comprehensive Braced Force of the Tourism Industry by City TransformationOn September 5, the reporter saw two luxurious cruises are in the final debugging stage in the Three Gorges Cruises Center along the Xiling Gorge. These two luxurious cruises are 87 meters long and 14.6 meters wide and are named as the Yangtze Three Gorges No. 8 and the Yangtze Three Gorges No. 9. They will formally set sail on September 17.
This is one of the landmark projects of the upgrading of Yichang tourism industry.
Feng Jiantao, General Manager of the Tourist Transport Department of Yichang Transportation Group said: “The Xiling Gorge is blessed with rich tourism resources, such as the Three Gorges Dam, the Three Gorges Folk Custom Tourist Site, the Three Visitors’ Cave and so on. In the past, these scenic spots were developed separately which failed to bring the resources to their full play. The new cruise is just like a thread, joining up these precious scenic spots and forming a tourism industry chain.”
It is introduced that the number of tourists visiting "Two Dams and One Gorge" (refering to the Gezhouba Dam, the Three Gorges Dam and the Xiling Gorge) amounted to 158,000 last year; this year, the number is expected to exceed 300,000. In the next few years, there will be 10 cruises putting into operation, with the carrying capacity of more than 1.5 million people. “Since the cruises can connect the scenic spots together, tourists will stay in Yichang one more day.” Feng Jiantao did the accounts and said: “ The tourist attractions tickets for one person is about 300 RMB, if a tourist stays in Yichang for one day, the potential consumption he brings is at least 500 RMB.” According to statistics, at present, duration time of the overnight visitors in Yichang gets to 2.2 days against 1.1 days over the same period last year.
The tourism industry shall not simply focus on the economy of tourist attractions tickets. It is quite necessary to make Yichang a tourist destination, realizing the integration of "food, accommodation, transportation, traveling, shopping and entertainment" to achieve consolidated income.
Based on this, Yichang will speed up the transformation process from tourism city to city tourism and further improve the construction of tourism infrastructure and other hardware. At the same time, it will vigorously promote the construction of One Zone, Two Belts and Five Centers. One Zone refers to the New Zone of the Three Gorges Tourism with a total area of 671 square kilometers; Two Belts refer to the riverside landscape belt and the expressway landscape belt; Five Centers are centers of traffic distribution, cultural entertainment, integrated services, commercial exhibition and ecological leisure tourism. By 2016, there will be 30,000 main players of cultural tourism market in Yichang, 70 enterprises with the output value of over 100 million RMB and one enterprise with the output value of over 10 billion RMB.
Promoting the Market Influence of City Brand via Marketing UpgradingYichang innovates the marketing mode; the nice voice of tourism resounds both at home and abroad.
On August 28, cosponsored by Yichang Tourism Bureau and “Falling in Love with Yichang” City and Travel Marketing Federation, the Community Square Dance Competition, themed “Falling in Love with Yichang; Dancing in Three Gorges ” ended in the Three Gorges Damming Memorial Park. Tourists watching the final competition amounted to 10,000 that day.
Before the final competition, 207 mass-elections and semi-finals have been held in 52 cities of eight provinces which attracted a total of more than 2000 square dance teams. The participants surpassed 40,000, and the audience exceeded one million.
Officials from Yichang Tourism Bureau said it was a successful marketing event. The audience not only participated in the activities but also learned of the comprehensive tourism information of the Three Gorges in Yichang. This kind of advertising method was widely recognized by people.
The “Falling in Love with Yichang” activity has aroused wide attention both at home and abroad. Tourism products of Yichang have already entered 46 countries in Europe, America, and so on.
According to the data from Yichang Tourism Bureau, last year, Yichang received 26.3934 million tourists from home and abroad, with the year-on-year growth of 36.73 percent. The tourism revenue totaled 20.038 billion RMB with the year-on-year growth of 41.83 percent. In the first half of this year, the number of domestic and foreign tourists counted 16.3795 million, and tourism revenue reached 11.862 billion RMB, with the year on year increase of 28.37 percent and 32.83 percent respectively.
Predictably, the upcoming Three Festivals in Yichang will greatly improve the recognition and reputation of Yichang and further enhance the attraction of Yihcang as a tourist resort.
(Initially carried out at the top of the first page in Hubei Daily on September 9)