China's outbound travel will exceed inbound travel by 100 million trips in the next five years, and more liberal visa policies have been called for to improve the situation, according to a report on China's inbound and outbound tourism.
The imbalance in outbound and inbound travel in China will expand further as applications for tourist visas have gotten easier globally, according to the report, which was jointly released by the Center for China and Globalization and Ctrip, a Chinese online travel services provider, thepaper.cn reported on Wednesday.
Erasing the imbalance is an urgent task, and it is necessary to reform the application process for Chinese tourist visas since it would have a direct influence on narrowing the trade deficit in tourism, the report suggested.
According to data from Ctrip, the number of Chinese tourists who will spend their Spring Festival Holiday overseas will reach 7 million.
Under the current economic situation, every industry is faced with global competition, and China should fix the shortage of inbound tourists if its tourist industry wants to be competitive in the global market, Liang Jianzhang, chairman and CEO of Ctrip, was quoted in the thepaper.cn report as saying.
"The difficulty of applying for Chinese tourist visas is the first threshold for foreign tourists coming to China," said Xi Weihang, a senior official from Ctrip.
China should establish self-service visa application platforms, with assistance from local groups to complete the information platforms for a more convenient application process and improve promotion activities in foreign countries to lure more tourists to China, according to the report.
