【Summit Review】Sharing Urban Development Experience to Boost Global Cultural Tourism Industry Upgrading

At present, the global cultural tourism industry is developing steadily, with digital technology, cultural heritage, and urban governance converging at an accelerated pace, profoundly reshaping the tourism development landscape. How to revitalize cultural tourism through refined governance, shape urban identity with distinctive cultural characteristics, and expand industrial space through digital and intelligent innovation has become a common challenge that tourism cities around the world must address.

During the WTCF Beijing Fragrant Hills Tourism Summit 2026, city administrators from multiple countries focused on the theme “Smarter Travel, Stronger Cities.” They shared practical measures and best practices around key topics such as modernizing urban governance, deepening the integration of culture and tourism, rolling out smart services, facilitating mutual connectivity of international tourist sources, and cultivating city brands-with the goal of building consensus for the high-quality development of global cultural tourism.

Zhang Ge, Secretary of the Haidian District Committee of Beijing, believes that the essence of future tourism lies in the revitalization of cultural heritage and the advancement of smart cities. He elaborated that Haidian’s relevant practices revolve around four dimensions: enriching the city with culture, so that millennia-old landscapes become an experiential urban poetry; reinvigorating ancient civilization with technology, giving it an expression fit for the future; integrating industries for growth, transforming cultural tourism vitality into a powerful driver of urban development; and governing cities with smartness, ensuring that developmental outcomes ultimately serve the people's better life. In terms of specific technologies, Haidian has leveraged Digital Twin, virtual reality, and artificial intelligence to meticulously restore the grandeur of the Forty Scenes and the Western-style buildings of the Old Summer Palace (Yuanmingyuan) , bringing these lost garden treasures back to life across time and space. At the same time, it has rolled out multilingual AI-powered smart guided tours and immersive interactive commentary across the district, breaking down language barriers and making every visit more precise, vivid, and internationally communicative.

Despoina Limniotaki, President of the City Council of Athens, the capital of Greece, stated that urban digital development must adhere to the people-centered principle as its core. Athens has fully integrated artificial intelligence into its official digital service system, leveraging intelligent tools to overcome foreign-language communication barriers and provide citizens and tourists with real-time access to a wide range of urban service information. The city has also collaborated with the National Technical University of Athens to build an intelligent traffic monitoring system, which, through a comprehensive historical data hub, enables real-time analysis and proactive measures to alleviate traffic congestion, ensuring safe and smooth travel for the public. She particularly emphasized that artificial intelligence is merely a tool for serving the city; cities should preserve their unique hospitality and safeguard the human warmth that is indispensable to the development of cultural tourism.

Sergi González Camacho, Mayor of Andorra la Vella, the capital of Andorra, focused on sharing experiences in addressing the challenge of high tourist volumes. As the highest-altitude capital in Europe, Andorra la Vella receives 9.5 million visitors annually, placing considerable strain on its urban population and public service capacity. González Camacho noted that drawing on the cultural tourism governance experience of international cities such as Beijing is highly valuable for solving local development challenges. Going forward, the city will balance the daily convenience of residents with the growth of the tourism industry, seize opportunities for international cooperation, work with enterprises from China and other countries to deploy smart cultural tourism products, and rely on digital tools to balance tourist flows with the city's operational carrying capacity.

Ion Ceban, Mayor of Chisinau, the capital of Moldova, approached the topic from the perspective of shifting consumer demands. He noted that tourists are no longer satisfied with basic sightseeing. Instead, they place greater value on immersive experiences, seamless connectivity, sustainable travel experiences, and the genuine emotional value that cities convey. In his view, the core of developing smart tourism lies in leveraging digital technologies to create a more convenient, inclusive, and friendly urban environment, thereby strengthening the bond between the city and its visitors. Chisinau has already launched a number of smart cultural tourism development projects.

Josy Michaud Payet, Mayor of Victoria, the capital of Seychelles, shared her insights from the perspective of small cities with limited resources. She noted that for small cities to build tourism brands with global appeal, the key lies in tapping into their unique and irreplicable local cultural heritage-local residents, traditional customs, distinctive architecture, and festive events are the core competitive strengths of a city. At the same time, small cities today have easy access to data analysis tools. Victoria, for example, uses data on visitor dwell time and tourist spending patterns to make informed decisions and precisely plan investments in cultural tourism infrastructure, thereby maximizing the use of limited resources.

Pabel Muñoz López, Mayor of Quito, the capital of Ecuador, outlined three core objectives for digital transformation: strengthening the tourism industry, boosting the urban economy, and enhancing the well-being of the people. Cities should leverage digital tools to improve data analysis and governance capabilities, using technology to streamline urban operational processes and continuously support the steady development of both the city and its cultural tourism sector.

Mario Durán, Mayor of San Salvador, the capital of El Salvador, proposed that the high-quality development of cultural tourism requires the organic integration of artificial intelligence, data analysis, and the sustainable protection of cultural heritage, so as to enhance industrial competitiveness and inclusiveness. He underscored the underlying logic of innovation: digital and smart upgrades should not take technological iteration as the ultimate goal; rather, all innovative measures must ultimately benefit the people and improve urban livelihood and well-being.