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Economic View Client May 20 (Yan Shuxin) Mountain tourism, as a modern form of tourism, has attracted more and more  tourists and industry players in recent years. According to the data, the share of mountain tourism in the global tourism market has reached 20%. Meanwhile, the domestic mountain tourism market has also been rapidly warming up, and gradually become one of the popular methods of residents’ leisure tourism.

What kind of mountain tourism products are most popular for tourists? What dangerous situations should be avoided in mountain tourism development? How to create attractive mountain tourism destination? The reporter of Economic View Client interviewed Dai Bin, the President of China Tourism Academy, on a series of issues mentioned above.

Dai Bin, the President of China Tourism Academy

Tourism demand is still the basic market demand

Mountain tourism has a long history in China. Dai Bin pointed out that China has a tradition of “The benevolent people enjoy mountains, and the wise people like rivers” since ancient times. By the 1930s and 1940s, a number of mountain-related leisure resorts were born. “At that time, these leisure resorts were enjoyable to minority groups, because of the inconvenience of transportation, most people still regarded mountains as dangerous roads.”

It was not until the 1950s that mountain tourism in China really rose. “Our country began to build some cadres’ and workers’ sanatoriums in mountain areas, and gradually realized that mountain areas can help us cultivate our body and mind.  In fact,  the people began to feel about mountains and rivers after the reform and opening, especially after the popularity of mass tourism. According to Dai Bin, the development of mountain tourism in China has gone through the top-down process. “In the past, it may have been enjoyed by only a minority, but now everyone can share it.”

However, as a whole, the development of mountain tourism in China is still in its infancy. Economic View Client understands that there are three main development modes of mountain tourism in China at present, which are based on eco-tourism, forest vacation and sport exploration. In Dai Bin’s opinion, eco-tourism is still the basic market of mountain tourism in China.

He pointed out that in the current situation, most of the tourists’ visiting mountain scenic spots still mainly focus on the view of mountains, rivers and scenery. “Mountain leisure vacation is one of our development directions, but objectively speaking, this part of the market demand is not yet mature, and it is still in the market lead-in period.”

So, Dai Bin stressed that when developing mountain tourism, the industry must not be separated from the basic demands and markets, and should not blindly develop mountain resorts. “Not all places are suitable for mountain vacation, but the surrounding mountains, which get close to the tourist market, are suitable for this mode of development.” For example, besides its natural scenery, the reason why Mogan Mountain can become a holiday resort is that it is close to the source of tourists. “Starting from Shanghai, Hangzhou, Suzhou and other places, it is very near by driving a car. However, if the resort is in the Himalayas, how do tourists get there?”

Dai Bin pointed out that the development of mountain tourism should be tailored to local conditions, but also to grasp the rhythm. “At present, tourism is still the foundation, so the industry needs to repair bridges, roads and let the people see what it was all about.”

Meanwhile, Dai Bin mentioned that the problem of homogeneity of domestic mountain tourism products is particularly prominent. After the completion of a glass trestle, various scenic spots are competing to imitate, “Now there are 241 glass trestles in the whole country, and others are also under construction.” In view of this, Dai Bin suggested that when developing mountain tourism products, the industry should try to cover groups of different ages and identities, while making more innovations to avoid clustering and similarities.

Developing while giving consideration to ecological protection 

Compared with other tourism resources, the ecological environment in mountain areas is relatively fragile. How to give consideration to ecological protection in the process of developing mountain tourism has always been a topic of discussion in the industry. 

For this, Dai Bin pointed out that when developing mountain tourism, we should advocate the concept of “viewing a mountain doesn’t necessarily mean entering into it”. He believes that tourism is an act of sharing, rather than an act of possession.

“For some mountain areas where the ecological environment is relatively fragile, we don’t have to enter. It’s also possible to turn around. We need to guide tourists in their thinking, so as to make their consumption and behavior more rational,” Dai Bin said. 

As for the controversial cableway construction in the industry, Dai Bin believes that we need to think rationally. “As long as someone enters the mountain area, it will bring some impacts. What we need to do is to minimize the impact. Meanwhile, we should also consider the balance between the rights of local people, tourists and sustainable development. The development of mountain tourism should oppose not only the pure commercial orientation and vulgarization orientation, but also some fundamentalist tendencies.

Dai Bin pointed out that from the current situation, the advantages of cableway construction outweigh its disadvantages. It meets the needs of some elderly people, disabled people and people with mobility disabilities. “The construction of cableways in scenic spots can be considered as long as they are not in the core areas. However, in this process, how to achieve the smallest impacts and damages, or need some experts to carefully study to find a maximum common denominator. For those ecological environment and fragile mountain areas, can not build cableways, but also need legislative protection when necessary. Therefore, a case-by-case review system should be in place,” Dai Bin said.

Three advantages help the development of China’s mountain tourism

China has unique advantages in developing mountain tourism. It is understood that the mountain area (including plateau and hill) in China reaches 6.66 million square kilometers, accounting for nearly 70% of the total land areas, which brings rich mountain tourism resources, including mountain natural and cultural heritage sites, mountain national scenic spots, mountain 5A scenic spots and so on, which are more than 50% of the total number of major scenic spots.

“With the development of history and the evolution of civilization, many famous mountains in China are linked to religious culture and  scholars calligraphy, such as Five Great Mountains, Four Famous Mountains of Buddhism and Mount Langya, etc. China is a mountainous country with beautiful natural scenery and long-standing humanistic tradition, which attracts people’s natural attention.” Dai Bin said.

In fact, besides the advantages of resources, the improvement of residents’ living standards and the gradual improvement of infrastructure construction are also the two major conditions to promote the development of mountain tourism in China.

“Our country has a population of 1.4 billion. With the development of economy and society, the people begin to prosper, and the demand for mass tourism has been growing stronger and stronger. With the improvement of traffic conditions, mountain areas have become accessible. More and more people begin to choose mountain tourism, and the market prospects of mountain tourism in China will become more and more broad.” Dai Bin said. 

It is worth mentioning that under the broad market prospects, mountain tourism is attracting more and more people’s attention. Economic View Client have learned that in order to promote the sustainable development of mountain tourism and create a good mountain tourism environment, in 2018, the International Mountain Tourism Alliance issued an initiative to set up an International Mountain Tourism Day to the whole world, and decided to designate May 29 as the special day. On May 29, 2019, the first International Mountain Tourism Day will be held in Kathmandu, Nepal.

Dai Bin believes that the  three aspect meanings of the setting up of International Mountain Tourism Day includes:

First, it arouses people’s awareness of being close to mountains and rivers. Dai Bin said that nowadays many young people prefer to stay at home, rather than being close to mountains and rivers. So the setting up of “International Mountain Tourism Day” can arouse their awareness of being close to mountains and rivers. “The country still hopes that our young people will be energetic and closing to the mountains and rivers can make our personality healthier, which is why we said that the development of tourism will promote civilization. Through mountain tourism, it makes more people, especially young people get close to the mountains and rivers that benefits to national and people’s interests.”

Second, it attracts more investors and operators to enter the mountain tourism market. Dai Bin pointed out that the mountain tourism market is huge, and the setting up of International Mountainous Tourism Day can attract more investors and operators to understand the market, thus investing the corresponding resources to promote the development of mountain tourism.

Third, the international exchange of mountain tourism has been strengthened. Dai Bin mentioned that the International Mountain Tourism Alliance launched the International Mountain Tourism Day to the whole world, providing a platform for mountain tourism organizations and market participants around the world to exchange and learn from each other, which is conducive to promoting international exchanges of mountain tourism.

Dai Bin believes that the setting up of International Mountain Tourism Day will benefit the protection and utilization of mountain tourism resources; the promotion of international exchanges and business cooperation in tourism; the summarizing of successful experiences in promoting mountain tourism development; the promotion of economic, cultural and social prosperity in mountain areas, and the promotion of sustainable development of mountain and ecological tourism to the whole. 

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