Now Shenzhen | January 25, 2024
CHINA’S 40-day Chunyun, or Spring Festival travel rush, the world’s largest human migration, will start Jan. 26 and conclude March 5, the Civil Aviation Administration of China announced at a press conference yesterday.
It is expected that 80 million air trips will be made during the period, averaging 2 million per day, with the potential to set a new historical record, the administration said.
The air passenger peak is expected to occur Feb. 8, one day ahead of the Chinese New Year’s Eve; Feb. 16, the second to last day of the Spring Festival holiday; and Feb. 25, the day after the Lantern Festival, the last day of the Spring Festival celebrations. The daily average number of flights will reach 16,500, according to the administration.
Popular air routes will mainly focus on the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, the Yangtze River Delta, the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, and the Chengdu-Chongqing urban agglomeration, according to the press conference.
Additionally, there will be a significant increase in passenger volume to southern cities such as Sanya and Haikou, as well as ice and snow tourism cities in Northeast China and Xinjiang in the northwest.
For outbound travel, countries in close proximity, such as Japan, South Korea, and Southeast Asian countries, will become hotspots, as per the administration.
This year’s eight-day Spring Festival break from Feb. 10 to 17, being longer by a day than previous years, will unleash the full potential of China’s dynamic travel and consumption markets, given that the Chinese have already shown their great enthusiasm for holiday journeys in the post-COVID-19 era, experts said.
The holiday will mark the first winter vacation and the first Spring Festival since China resumed group outbound tourism after the pandemic subsided.
Outbound tourism will surpass the levels seen during the summer vacation and the National Day holiday in 2023, industry experts forecast.
In the first three quarters of 2023, Chinese consumers spent 3.69 trillion yuan (US$515 billion) on domestic travel, up more than 114 % year on year, according to the Ministry of Culture and Tourism.
ARTICLE FROM: Shenzhen Daily