Inbound visits to Chinese mainland up 3.6% in 2017

Travelers from Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan made 100 million trips to the Chinese mainland last year, making up nearly 80 percent of all inbound visits, according to a report by the China Tourism Academy on Wednesday.

The mainland received a record 29.2 million individual inbound visits last year — not including those from Hong Kong, Macao or Taiwan — an increase of 3.6 percent from 2016, the report said.

Visitors mostly came from Myanmar, Vietnam, South Korea, Japan, Russia, the United States, Mongolia, Malaysia, Philippines and India.

Revenue from China’s inbound tourist sector last year rose 2.9 percent year-on-year to $123.4 billion, with foreigners contributing $69.5 billion.

Dai Bin, the academy’s chairman, said more efforts will be stressed in promoting travel services, language assistance and tour package promotions to boost the solid development of China’s inbound tourist industry.