Wang Hong, Executive Vice Chairman of the WTCF Council and Vice Mayor of Beijing: Promoting the Comprehensive Recovery and Revitalization of Tourism, Enhancing Sustainable Development of Cities

On 3 September, themed "Revitalizing World Tourism and Energizing City Development", 2021 WTCF Beijing Fragrant Hills Tourism Summit & World Conference on Tourism Cooperation and Development opened in Beijing. The event was organized by the World Tourism Cities Federation (WTCF) and the People's Government of Beijing Municipality together with the world's major international organizations and tourism institutions. In the Keynote Speeches session, Wang Hong, Executive Vice Chairman of the WTCF Council and Vice Mayor of Beijing, noted that WTCF will vigorously promote cooperation and development of global tourism, explore major drivers to energize city development, and work together with all member cities for the well-being of the globe.

Wang Hong, Executive Vice Chairman of the WTCF Council and Vice Mayor of Beijing delivers a keynote speech

Tourism is an important part of the global economy, and the sector is vulnerable to a variety of crises. In 2020, the number of international trips plummeted by 1.03 billion, and overall tourism revenues dropped by 69%. But Wang Hong believes the difficulties will not remain long considering the development of tourism over the past 180 years. As the globe is enhancing cooperation to fight COVID-19, the number of tourists in some countries has seen an obvious increase. In some countries, more people choose to make domestic trips. Although the pandemic has dealt a heavy blow to tourism, it has inspired the sector to accelerate reforms and transformation. New forms and patterns are emerging with robust development, driving the rebound in global tourism.

Ever since the pandemic hit the world, world tourism has been dealing a series of new challenges and opportunities. At the same time, great changes have taken place in the development trends of global tourism. First, domestic tourism is gaining popularity in tourism markets. Wang Hong stated that travelers now prefer domestic and short-distance trips considering that countries have taken different measures of pandemic prevention and control at the same time. Moreover, such trips are now crucial for the stable growth of tourism revenues. Last year, domestic tourism revenues around the world reached 2.4 trillion US dollars, more than four times international tourism revenues. Now, domestic tourism markets are of great significance for tourism growth in all countries. In the near future, it will remain the same. Second, the supply and demand of tourism has seen a stronger tendency for diversification. The pandemic has stimulated the growth of many new methods, patterns and forms of tourism. High-quality, personalized tourism in low-density areas involving fewer people has won the favor of not only users but also service providers. Third, science and technology are energizing the tourism revitalization. New technologies have been widely applied to various travel scenarios, tremendously influencing the content, method, scale and speed of tourism development. The integrated development of tourism involving various fields has contributed to frequent online and offline interaction. Wang Hong observed that the tourism sector should identify changes in time, deal with them effectively, and make changes happen to create a better future.

World tourism cities are the main sources of travelers, destinations and hubs for the world's tourism. They play an irreplaceable role in the global tourism development system. New tourism development trends have brought new opportunities for the world tourism cities. Wang Hong stressed that world tourism cities should take immediate action to cooperate more extensively and act more actively to accelerate essential changes of tourism in the new context, and bring global tourism into a new stage of development.

First, tourism cities should adopt innovative tourism management patterns and help improve urban management. Wang Hong hoped that WTCF member cities will learn from each other for successful experience of fighting the pandemic, improve the emergency rescue system of tourism cities, build a better safety mechanism for global tourism, and strengthen the security of international tourism. At the same time, cities should promote tourism development according to the needs of citizens for better lives, develop better tourism products, hold high-quality tourism events, and provide support for improving the fine management of urban communities.

Second, tourism cities should keenly observe changes in market demands, help improve urban services, promote tourism in low-density areas, decentralized, customized and reservation-based tourism, as well as significantly improve tourism services to offer greater convenience. Efforts are required to accelerate the building of comprehensive service networks covering multiple cities and integrating dining, accommodation, travel, shopping and entertainment, to interlink source markets of tourists and destinations and provide better services for travelers. Besides, adjustment of service standards and establishment of new standards in time will help cities better coordinate pandemic prevention and control, quality improvement as well as cost reduction of enterprises.

Third, technological application will help build smart cities. Big data, cloud computing, mobile telecommunications and smart terminals will contribute to the development of smart tourism and smart cities. Tourism cities need to accelerate their digital and smart transformation, invest more in information infrastructure, jointly build public service platforms covering the world tourism cities, support new forms and patterns centered on new technologies, encourage more tourism enterprises to develop new models and products, so that the tourism sector will witness sustainable development.

WTCF is the world's first international tourism organization centered on tourism cities. Adhering to the core concept of "Better City Life through Tourism", it is devoted to promoting cooperation and development of world tourism. Wang Hong noted: "WTCF will join hands with all member cities and institutions by boosting practical cooperation among tourism cities in information, culture, management and other fields, in order to enhance global tourism recovery and development of tourism cities".