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Australia’s battered tourism puts hope in China’s reopening | Business and Economy

Sydney, Australia – CBT Holidays, a Sydney-based travel agency, hopes China’s reopening of the border will revive Australia’s tourism industry after a “survival” year.

The travel company lost access to its largest market in 2020 as both Australia and China closed their borders in response to the arrival of COVID-19. For much of 2021, CBT Holidays, which focuses on package tours to China, was shut down completely due to a lack of customers.

Despite Australia’s reopening to visitors in February 2022 and efforts by many tour operators to shift their focus to domestic tourism, business for the most part remains stagnant. last year.

While Australians are still quarantined from China, the number of Chinese visitors to Australia has fallen by more than 95% from 1.43 million visitors in 2019.

“Initially, we received some compensation from [the] Eric Wong, product manager for CBT Holidays, told AL Jazeera.

“And [then] We just closed the business.

Now, like China reopens borders From Sunday it is likely that millions of Chinese, including tourists, students and business travelers, are expected to travel abroad to destinations like Australia for the first time in three years.

“[It’s] good news, the Chinese border is open,” Jimmy L, owner of CBT Holidays, told Al Jazeera, asking him to be called by his first and last name.

“More or less, the business will come… and then we can make a profit.”

However, he remains cautious about how long it will take for business to recover, especially given the lack of flights to and from China and the steep cost of fares.

“For example, in the past, a round trip ticket to China was about A$1,000 ($688). And now [it’s] 8,000, 9,000 won [Australian dollars] ($5,500, $6,200)… to the economy,” he said.

Sun, chief executive officer of China Travel Service, another China-focused operator in Sydney, agreed.

There are currently only “a few flights” to Australia from China, carrying only a few hundred passengers, Sun told Al Jazeera, asking to be called by his last name.

While Chinese airlines are increasing flights to and from Australia, Australia’s national carrier, Qantas, has yet to announce the resumption of flights to China.

“I think that will change a lot… as airlines increase their flight schedules… I think people-to-people exchanges between these two countries will become more and more frequent and then gradually return to normal,” Sun said. speak.

Beijing airport
China is reopening its borders after three years of difficult pandemic control [File: Andy Wong/AP]

So far, the Australian government has done little to encourage travel between China and Australia, although Chinese tourists account for A$12.3 billion ($8.5 billion), or a third of the total. tourist spending before the pandemic.

On New Year’s Day, Australia announced that travelers from China, including Hong Kong and Macau, would have to provide a negative COVID-19 test result before traveling amid fears of potential risks. Increased cases in China could lead to new and more deadly variants for Australia.

The Australian government announced the measures – following similar moves by countries including India, Japan, the UK and the US – despite advice from the country’s chief medical officer that these New restrictions on travel are not required.

Beijing condemned the measures, saying that any COVID-19 control policy should be “proportionate” and “based on science”, without affecting “normal travel nor such as human-to-human exchange and cooperation”.

Sun said he wasn’t too worried about inspections preventing or stopping some Chinese from making the trip to Australia.

“I think that’s fine… That’s very, very reasonable,” he said. “Even now, for Australians or Chinese Australians visiting China, they still need a 48-hour COVID test. It’s the same.”

“I also think we need time – policy can change,” he added.

But Sun said there was still a lot of work to be done to encourage the Chinese to flock back to Australia.

“We still need [to] reconnect with those hotels, those tourist attractions, then get new equipment, new contracts, and based on that we create a new product for domestic Chinese customers,” he said.

“Also, we need to reconnect with the Chinese travel agency[ies] create a package tourism product for Australians [travelling to China] so it will take us a few months to prepare for that.”

At the same time, Sun said he has learned from experience that it is important for his business to continue expanding beyond China to secure its future.

“We can’t put all our eggs in one basket,” he said, adding that CTS has already begun to expand.

Meanwhile, companies like CTS are eagerly anticipating the return of Chinese tourists.

Sun said while he had expected China to eventually open its borders, he did not expect it to happen so soon.

That’s why when people hear this news, especially in this industry, they are very excited,” he said. “We are very happy. [It’s] Good news.”



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