Qingdao Fragrant Hills Tourism Summit 2018 Exclusive Interview: Qingdao Summit Superposition Effect Highlighted

With the success of the SCO Summit in Qingdao, the city’s popularity and influence have risen tremendously in China and overseas. A good urban environment, attractive urban landscape and more colorful tourism resources and products have contributed to the explosive growth in the number of tourists. Over time, the “summit effect” has continued to expand in this coastal city.

Building an international tourist destination has always been the focus and goal of Qingdao. As early as 2013, Qingdao proposed the goal of building an international tourist destination from “all dimensions, all directions and all factors”. On this basis, it defined the idea of actively promoting “three fundamental transformations”, namely transformation of spatial layout from coastal distribution to whole-region and multi-point support, transformation of industrial development from a single format to deep integration of multiple industries, and transformation of the structure type from leisure sightseeing to leisure touring.

In recent years, we have continued to deepen reforms around the above goal and concept, strived to build a holistic tourism destination, enhanced internationalization level through foreign exchanges and cooperation, compiled and issued the Outline of Holistic Tourism Planning, established a spatial layout of “one belt, one axis, three gulfs, three mountains and fifteen communities” and five key sectors – coastal resorts, marine leisure, quality village, integration & innovation and output service, formulated a series of industrial development policies, strengthened construction of soft and hard infrastructure, and comprehensively improved the overall livability and tourism suitability.

In particular, efforts have been made to promote tourism internationalization. Cooperation on tourism has been established with 83 cities and organizations in 26 countries and regions worldwide, and more than 180 domestic and international air routes to nearly 100 cities around the world have been established. In addition, we have implemented the 72-hour visa-free transit policy for tourists from 51 countries and regions, and actively bid for international tourism summits like the World Tourism Cities Federation Fragrant Summit. The influence and reputation of Qingdao as an international tourist destination have been consistently improved. Chinese and international media and websites have repeatedly rated Qingdao as the most popular tourist destination and awarded the city many other titles.

The Summit will lead Qingdao towards internationalization. The success of the SCO Summit in Qingdao, the gathering of 12 heads of states or governments, 10 heads of international organizations or institutions and many world-famous media, especially the extensive coverage in online we-media and traditional media before and after the Summit have made Qingdao an “online hotspot”, and its popularity and influence in China and overseas have greatly improved. The World Tourism Cities Federation Qingdao Fragrant Tourism Summit is another important international event to be held in Qingdao after the SCO Summit. Nearly 100 tourist cities and more than 200 tourism-related enterprises from all over the world and a number of international tourism organizations including the United Nations World Tourism Organization will gather in Qingdao to discuss global tourism development and seek international tourism exchanges and cooperation, which will further enlarge the SCO Summit effect and enhance Qingdao's international influence and reputation.

The Summit will promote high-end development of tourism. President Xi Jinping fully affirmed the success of the SCO Summit in Qingdao, and earnestly hoped that we would summarize the experience of “holding a summit and invigorating a city” and take our work to a new level. The key to "invigorating a city" is to invigorate industries, transforming them from low-end to high-end and from old drivers to new drivers of growth. The Qingdao Fragrant Tourism Summit is a concrete opportunity for “holding a summit and invigorating a city”, and positively explores transformation and upgrade by leveraging the opportunity of urban development, after the SCO Summit. The Summit will promote Qingdao’s tourism development to a higher level from various aspects. On the one hand, the superposition and release of the summit effect will surely attract more international conferences and events to be held in Qingdao, which will fully promote the development of Qingdao's conference, exhibition and tourism industries, and bring more high-end and inbound tourists to Qingdao. On the other hand, with the success of the Summit, Qingdao's tourism value, resource value and brand value will have greater development potential. Investment in large-scale tourism projects, introduction of high-end tourism industries, in-depth reforms in tourism enterprises and market players, and integration and innovation of tourism resources and products will be on the fast track, thereby accelerating Qingdao’s move towards developing a high-end, high-quality and diversified tourism industry.

The Summit will promote standardization of tourism services. In preparing for the Summit, Qingdao has vigorously enhanced its appearance, environmental order, greening, infrastructure, etc., creating better-quality infrastructure and environment for tourism development. At the same time, the tourism industry has consistently carried out a series of special promotion and improvement measures for key areas such as safe production, environmental order and service quality of hotels, scenic spots and toilets. Also, relevant departments have jointly carried out themed activities such as civilized tourism, volunteer services, etc., further improving the soft infrastructure and environment for tourism development. Today, walking in the streets and lanes of Qingdao, we can clearly perceive the tremendous change in the city's environment quality. Qingdao is a livable city suitable for business and travel and has created a high-quality tourism experience for domestic and international tourists. The forthcoming Qingdao Fragrant Tourism Summit is not only an important platform for demonstrating Qingdao's tourism service level after the SCO Summit, but also an opportunity to further improve the standardization of tourism services. It is believed that thanks to the two summits, the standardization and refinement levels of Qingdao’s tourism services will be further enhanced, and the style and charm of Qingdao will be better showcased among the first batch of China's tourism standardization demonstration cities.