Guizhou's focus on tourism industry bears fruit

Guizhou province is becoming a destination known among global tourists for natural sceneries and ethnic culture, as demonstrated by its selection as one of the "top 10 regions to visit in 2020" by Lonely Planet. Guizhou was the only region in China to be selected for the list by the iconic travel guide book company.

Relying on the supply-side structural reform of the tourism industry, Guizhou's tourist volume and tourism revenue have maintained a growth rate of more than 30 percent over the past four years.

Since 2016, Guizhou's government has considered the tourism industry as one of the province's three advantageous industries. The province has promoted itself as "Colorful Guizhou" with global publicity activities to expand awareness in the domestic and international markets.

Despite the impact of the novel coronavirus epidemic, Guizhou's August tourist volume and tourism revenue recovered to 93 percent and 55 percent of the same period last year, after trans-provincial tourism resumed in July.

Tourism development plays a significant role in Guizhou's poverty alleviation efforts, as tourists' accommodation, dining, shopping and entertainment consumption can increase the income of impoverished villages.

Guizhou has developed tourism resources in 14 severely impoverished counties, 20 extremely impoverished counties and towns, and 2,760 severely impoverished villages since 2016.

Meanwhile, Guizhou focuses on constructing 131 provincial rural tourism demonstration areas and 1,104 rural tourism poverty alleviation villages to allow more impoverished people to benefit from rural tourism development.

So far, more than 1 million impoverished people saw an increase in their income by participating in the tourism industry.

Guizhou also attaches importance to improving the tourism environment and services and encourages tourists to comment on Guizhou's supervision of the tourism industry, public tourism facilities, and tourism companies' services.

At the same time, Guizhou has integrated tourism with big data to provide convenient and customized tourism services. Its official online tourism platform, which was launched this May, allows tourists to access all the information they need during travel by scanning a QR code with their smartphones.