travel

On November 30, Hainan Airlines and CBBC hosted an event for businesses hoping to harness the power of the Lunar New Year holiday to lure Chinese consumers back to the UK. The panel consisted of Peter Han, general manager of Hainan Airlines; Alexander Graham, global brand director at Luxe Life; and Arnold Ma, co-founder of Qumin. As Celine Tang – CBBC’s Retail & e-Commerce Sector Lead – pointed out at …

On 24 November 2023, China announced a new visa-free entry policy for ordinary passport holders from France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain and Malaysia, effective from 1 December 2023 to 30 November 2024. This policy allows for business and tourism for up to 15 days per entry. The timing of this announcement and the countries selected have prompted speculation. Apart from Malaysia, which on 26 November announced that Chinese tourists …

Outbound tourism from China is slowly recovering post-Covid, but the tourists that are coming back are not necessarily spending and behaving the way that they used to. With the Lunar New Year (known in China as Spring Festival) peak travel period approaching, how should UK companies prepare for the return of the Chinese tourist? Pre-Covid, China’s international tourism spend, at £225 billion, was the most of any country in the …

In a strategic move aimed at bolstering international tourism and engagement, on 20 September 2023, China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) announced that it will roll out improvements to the visa application process According to the MFA, the improvements include “seven major and 15 sub-items”, but the main changes involve simplifying the visa application form by reducing the amount of background information applicants need to provide. The changes follow the …

Dragon Boat Festival, a traditional festival celebrated with a three-day national holiday from 22-24 June, has proven to be a significant catalyst for China’s tourism industry and consumer spending, although some dark clouds remain Despite the lingering effects of the Covid-19 pandemic, this year’s Dragon Boat Festival holiday saw a remarkable surge in travel numbers, both domestically and internationally, as well as a considerable increase in overall tourism spending. There …

As of 15 March 2023, the Chinese government resumed its pre-Covid visa and entry policies for foreigners to China, reinstating tourist visas and other visas issued prior to the pandemic. Here’s the CBBC summary The changes were announced during a press conference with China’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin, who noted that they will further facilitate people-to-people exchanges between China and foreign countries. The change follows the resumption of the …

Before the Covid-19 pandemic, Chinese travellers were the number one contributors to global tourism. Now that travel restrictions have been lifted, when can we expect the return of Chinese tourists to the UK? Since most day-to-day Covid restrictions were lifted in December, domestic travel in China has bounced back with a vengeance, helped by the start of the annual Lunar New Year travel rush. It is predicted that more than …

In December 2022, after nearly three years, zero covid appears to have been confined to memory, with China entering the early stages of a new “coexisting with covid” strategy, writes Tom Simpson, CBBC’s Managing Director of China Operations and Chief China Representative Why the sudden change? The 180-policy reversal seems to have been prompted by three main factors: a major outbreak in Beijing, growing frustration at zero covid (and hard …

China’s latest Covid policies have loosened the restrictions for travel between the UK and China somewhat, but travellers should be aware of changing Covid restrictions on the ground On 11 November, the China National Health Commission released a list of 20 adjustments to the country’s Covid-19 prevention and control policies. The adjustments relate to both the domestic-level implementation of Covid policies and international travel, including shortening the length of hotel …

Thanks to a series of recent policy relaxations, travel to China is beginning to get easier and an increasing number of direct flights between the UK and China are also now available. Read on for the latest updates Summer 2022 saw a reduction of China’s quarantine duration from 21 to 10 days (seven days in a quarantine hotel and three days in your place of residence, if permissible), as well …