Tianjin district to double tourism investment in 2020

Jizhou district in the northernmost part of Tianjin announced it will double its investment in the tourism sector from 1.4 billion yuan ($202 million) to 3 billion yuan in 2020.

Li Shuling, director of the Jizhou district culture and tourism bureau, said the district plans to construct 13 cultural and tourism projects to attract tourists from the Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei regions.

The efforts are part of the district's ambitious campaign in recent two years after closing all its coal mines and other polluting sectors.

The projects will include the Sino-British Eden Project, an ecological park evolved from coal mines, a fairy tale-like ecological zoo in Panshan Mountain, a snow sports tourism resort town, a natural country resort town of Jizhou, and a Wanda Plaza project.

These projects will involve large investment, are of high standards and are expected to become large, first-class cultural tourism complex projects in the country, the director said.

In addition, Jizhou plans to build a characteristic sports town in Xiaoying town and a tourism culture leisure resort, and also launch a renovation project of the ancient Great Wall in Huangyaguan as well as a geological town in Yuyang town, just to name a few.

This year, Jizhou will focus on the middle- and high-end consumer groups, develop 50 high-end homestays, upgrade 100 farmyards, and build two municipal-level cultural tourism villages.

In 2019, the district saw rapid growth in the tourism sector. It received 28 million Chinese and foreign tourists, up 8 percent year-on-year.

The sector's overall revenue reached 16.5 billion yuan during the period, up 15 percent year-on-year.

At present, the number of agritainment farmyards has reached 2,600, with 61,000 beds, recording the highest number of its kind among the Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei region.

The tourism sector has provided 60,000 jobs for farmers, benefiting 180,000 local residents.

Li Jian, Jizhou's vice-director, said the district has closed up to 12.46 square kilometers of mines, and an additional 50 sq km have been shut down in surrounding areas.

Wang Junru, another vice district director, said the total investment of the environmental renovation and the rehabilitation of the closed mines hit 2 billion yuan, to date.