SHANGHAI, November 10. /TASS/. The establishment of the Visit Russia office in Shanghai will enhance Russia’s competitiveness on the Chinese tourism market, deputy head of the Federal Agency for Tourism (Rostourism) Sergei Korneyev told TASS following the opening ceremony of the office.
“We plan to strengthen Russia’s position on Chinese tourism market which is very promising as far as inbound tourism goes. The Chinese are among the most active travellers in the world,” he said.
According to the United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO), in his words, in 2015, 120,000,000 Chinese tourists visited foreign countries, spending a total of around $105 billion during their trips. “This is a huge piece of the global tourism industry pie that we have to struggle for,” Korneyev stressed.
“In China we should present the possibilities for tourism in Russia so that we can take our rightful place among the rival countries who fight to woo Asian tourists. So the national office for tourism in Beijing was one of the first to open in October 2015. We continue to pursue this policy so today we have opened the second office in Shanghai. Thus we enter the Chinese regions where people are well off as they are involved in modern industries. Shanghai, China’s financial center, is one of such regions,” Sergei Korneyev added.
2018 World Cup
Koreneyev went on to say that Rostourism expected Chinese tourists to take much interest in the 2018 World Football Cup.
“Cooperation between Russia and China has been actively developing since 2012 that was the Year of Russian Tourism in China. Since then, the Chinese tourist inflow to Russia has grown more than three times. In 2012, 340,000 Chinese tourists visited Russia while in 2015 their number exceeded 1,000,000,” he said.
“Now we should attract as many middle-aged tourists as possible, we should attract people who are older than 30 years, members of the middle class who take interest in various Russian regions. So we will pay much attention to the promotion of package tours for the 2018 World Cup. The possibility to take part in such a great sports event during a tourist trip to Russia is sure to attract not only football fans but also many active tourists,” he stressed.
Visit Russia project
The Visit Russia project, that is being implemented by the Federal Agency for Tourism together with private investors, is aimed at promoting the inbound and domestic tourism in Russia. Deputy head of Rostourism Sergei Korneyev launched his project on July 3, 2015. Soon after that, panels advertising the Crimean resorts began to be installed all over Russia, while the billboards installed in Crimea advertised the country’s north-western regions (the so-called ‘Silver Ring’).
Two Visit Russia offices have been opened so far, one in Beijing and the other in Shanghai.