World cashes in as more people travel overseas

In an upmarket Beijing cafe, Gong Jiayi sips her flat white coffee and enthusiastically runs through the highlights of her latest holiday to Japan.

It was her third trip to the country and she insists it will not be her last. But when talk turns to her travels through Europe, her ardor diminishes. "Europe is good, but its not that good," she says.

Gong is a 27-year-old, middle-class professional and one of an estimated 100 million Chinese tourists who have traveled abroad this year.