Leisure and vacation become a new driving force for development

Leisure and vacation become a new driving force for development

 

Located at the foot of the Tianshan Mountains, in the Jiangbulake Scenic Spot in Qitai County, Xinjiang, the blooming tulips and snow-capped mountains, grasslands, and pine forests are set against each other, attracting tourists to watch. Photo by Cai Zengle (People's Vision)

The leisure and vacation industry has become the "main force" to undertake the return of outbound tourism consumption, and urban leisure and rural vacations have become the "ballast stone" to meet the tourism needs of urban and rural residents.

This is the view in the "2021 China Leisure and Holiday Industry Development Trend Report" released at the 2021 China Leisure and Holiday Conference.

The new business of cultural tourism has a strong momentum

This year, the leisure and vacation consumer market has gradually recovered, showing a more optimistic recovery trend. According to the data calculated by the Data Center of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, the number of leisure travel has basically recovered to the same period in 2019. This year, the recovery of the Spring Festival, Qingming and "May Day" holidays has continued to improve, which means leisure travel consumption. The demand is still strong.

The "2021 China Leisure and Holiday Industry Development Trend Report" released by the Leisure and Holiday Branch of the China Tourism Association shows that the cultural industry in the leisure sector is generally recovering better than the tourism industry because it is not restricted by the distance of domestic travel. In the first quarter of this year, the cultural market showed signs of recovery, and the development of new cultural businesses maintained a strong momentum. According to a survey conducted by the National Bureau of Statistics of 63,000 cultural and related industrial enterprises above designated size across the country, in the first quarter, the above-mentioned enterprises achieved operating income of 2.5498 billion yuan, a 40.4% increase over the same period in 2020 and an increase of 20.9 over the same period in 2019 on a comparable basis. %.

Sports consumption in the leisure sector is related to health. Under the epidemic, leisure sports consumption in some hot areas is showing a trend of bucking the trend. In the field of sports fitness equipment, during the Spring Festival this year, the turnover of fitness products on Taobao, Tmall, Xianyu and other platforms increased by 968% from the previous month, and the number of transactions rose by 783%. Among them, home fitness equipment such as household horizontal bars, skipping ropes, and fitness pedals The turnover increased by more than 100% year-on-year. This shows the potential of sports consumption and also reflects the new demands and new directions of family leisure.

Online sports and leisure consumption is active. Sports and fitness apps such as Gudong, Mint, Jelly Bean Square Dance, and Xiaomi Sports have shown rapid growth in user downloads and daily activity. Outdoor sports and leisure are also enthusiastic. Taking outdoor sports equipment as an example, this spring, mountaineering, camping, running, cycling and other sports occupied the top four in the top-selling product list of sports brand Decathlon, and the sales momentum of camping products surpassed the same period in 2019.

Residents read in the study in the central city of Happy Neighborhood, Nanxun District, Huzhou City, Zhejiang Province. Photo by Guo Junfeng (People's Vision)

Leisure vacation has become a consumption hotspot

Nowadays, Chinese people pay more and more attention to leisure, and leisure has become an indispensable part of daily life. The "Survey of Chinese National Leisure Status (2020)" conducted by the Tourism Research Center of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and the Tencent Institute of Cultural Tourism Industry (2020) shows that the most frequent leisure activities in local leisure are: visiting parks or local attractions, gathering with friends, shopping, Outdoor fitness, watching movies or watching sports performances, atmosphere recreation, game recreation, indoor fitness, community activities, visiting exhibition halls, beauty massage, interest training, etc.

The leisure and holiday industry develops in different ways in cities and villages and is becoming a consumer hot spot. Cities are not only an important source market for leisure tourists and an important leisure consumption market, but also a key area for the government to promote leisure development. Last year, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, the National Development and Reform Commission, and the Ministry of Finance announced the first batch of 15 national cultural and tourism consumption model cities and 60 national cultural and tourism consumption pilot cities. Focusing on cultural and tourism consumption, Chengdu uses night economy, weekend economy, etc. as the engine, supported by multi-pole and multi-point cultural consumption activities, and takes "cultural tourism+" and "cultural tourism integration+" as the core to promote leisure cultural tourism consumption . Shanghai Xuhui District, centering on the brand building of "Shanghai Culture" and "Shanghai Shopping", actively exerts the effects of "first launch" and "first store", attracting domestic and international outstanding cultural and tourism festivals and brand projects, and constantly creating new consumer hot spots. Dongcheng District, Beijing, centered on the "East of the Forbidden City" brand, explored the brand connotation, expanded the extension and application of the brand in the commercial field, and promoted the landing of cultural and tourism consumption.

Country vacations are becoming an important way of leisure for urban residents. According to the calculations of the National Rural Tourism Monitoring Center, in the first quarter of this year, the total number of rural tourism receptions nationwide was 984 million, an increase of 5.2% over the same period in 2019; the total national rural tourism revenue was 389.8 billion yuan, an increase of 2.1% over the same period in 2019.

Develop the potential market for leisure and vacation

The report analyzes that leisure vacation consumption corresponds to service consumption and final consumption, and corresponds to multi-level consumption and repeatable consumption. It is an important manifestation of the people's good life. The Chinese people have great potential for leisure and vacation. Under the new economic development pattern, the leisure and holiday industry is expected to become a new starting point for promoting the domestic economic cycle and a new driving force for structural transformation and economic growth.

From the perspective of leisure vacation consumers, the leisure potential of some emerging groups is worthy of attention. The elderly leisure market is a blue ocean. Taking leisure tourism as an example, elderly tourism accounts for about 20% of the total market tourism, and there is a trend of strong and rising demand. It is worth noting that the consumption frequency and level of leisure and vacation consumption for the elderly have increased significantly, which provides new opportunities for leisure and vacation related industries.

Family parent-child leisure is the leisure and vacation market with the most growth potential. Compared with other themed tours, the parent-child tour market has recovered considerably. In the distribution of parent-child travel themes in 2020, theme parks accounted for 27%, natural scenery accounted for 22%, and architecture and humanities accounted for 19%. Family parent-child leisure will have much room for improvement in the supply of targeted and differentiated products in the future. In addition, single leisure also has a considerable market. Single groups have a lot of time to spend, have a strong willingness to socialize, and like customized and leisure products that are exclusive to themselves or small groups.

The report expects that during the "14th Five-Year Plan" period, digital culture, "Internet + tourism", and online and offline sports integration will become key areas for the government to promote the technologicalization of leisure and vacation. 5G, big data, artificial intelligence, blockchain and other technologies will play a greater role in enriching the leisure vacation experience, increasing leisure vacation consumption, and improving the efficiency of leisure vacation services; technological advancement will also create a richer leisure vacation Consumption scenarios, to enhance the convenience of leisure and vacation consumption.