Visas on arrival and open-skies deal for holiday island will be a model for nation
Hainan province is being made a testing ground for radical liberalisation that the central government hopes will boost its tourism industry and help the southern island compete with Bali and Phuket.
Government officials and consultants who helped formulate the plan for the tropical island say it will be transformed into a special tourism zone with immediate effect. Foreign airlines will have freedom of access to the airports at Haikou and Sanya under an 'open skies' regime, with unlimited rights to fly people and cargo to and from Hainan and the ability to fly beyond the island to third countries.
The central government will also progressively expand visa-free travel to Hainan, which currently applies to 21 countries. Eventually, citizens of any country will be able to apply for visas on arrival, they said.
Policymakers said it would serve as a model for the rest of the country.
Wu Zhouhong, a director of the international affairs department of the General Administration for Civil Aviation of China (CAAC), the mainland's aviation industry regulator, said the open-skies policy may be rolled out in major cities such as Shanghai and Beijing if it proved successful in Hainan.