Coronavirus and floods destroy China’s Dragon Boat Festival holiday plans

Tourism revenues down nearly 70 per cent with only half of last year’s number of trips taken during three-day break

New wave of infections in Beijing, severe flooding in southern provinces and sluggish income growth combine to keep people at home

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Severe flooding in southern China contributed to the drastic fall in tourism during this year’s three-day Dragon Boat Festival holiday. Photo: VCG

Published: 2:40pm, 28 Jun 2020Updated: 9:36am, 29 Jun 2020

China’s tourism revenues slumped by nearly 70 per cent during the three-day Dragon Boat Festival, as people shunned trips amid a new wave of coronavirus infections in the north and floods in the country’s southern provinces.

Chinese tourists made 48.8 million trips during the holiday, which ended on Saturday, only half the number recorded a year earlier. As a result, tourism revenue plunged by 69 per cent to 12.3 billion yuan (US$1.7 billion), according to the Ministry of Culture and Tourism.

The sluggish figures were due to the “dual challenges from the pandemic and floods”, the ministry said on Saturday. In a bid to boost consumer confidence, the ministry avoided words suggesting declines. Instead, it said tourism was in the process of crawling back to a normal level.

The holiday commemorates the death of Qu Yuan, a patriotic poet and politician who lived during the Warring States period around 2,300 years ago. China made it a statutory holiday in 2007 to promote Chinese culture and boost consumption.

Tourism demand this year was dampened by social distancing measures, especially China’s requirement that all tourist destinations should run at no more than 30 per cent of their capacity, according to the ministry.

Based on hotel and airline ticket booking figures, China’s largest online travel services provider Ctrip said the domestic tourism market had been recovering since March after a slump in February when the central Chinese city of Wuhan was in lockdown and the coronavirus pandemic was at its height.

However, the pace of growth in June slowed from the previous months, Ctrip said in a report released on Saturday.

In Beijing, official data showed 1.35 million trips were made to the city’s 161 tourist attractions during the holiday, down 77 per cent from a year earlier. Tourism revenues declined by 76 per cent to 72 million yuan, driven lower by a new outbreak of Covid-19 which began on June 11 and has infected 311 people in the capital and put neighbouring destinations on alert.