World Tourism Alliance unveils headquarters in Hangzhou

The headquarters of the World Tourism Alliance opened in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province, on Friday.

The alliance, an international non-governmental and non-profit organization initiated by China, announced to base its headquarters in Hangzhou in December 2017 after being formally founded in September that year. The construction work started in late March 2019.

Zhang Xu, chairman of the alliance, said at a ceremony on Friday in Hangzhou that the completion of the headquarters is not only a landmark in the alliance's history, but a new beginning of the sustainable development of the world tourism.

He said the headquarters bears efforts of people involved in its construction and anticipations of the tourism industry insiders, which also expresses the tourism industry operators' wishes to take part in the world management and global cooperation.

According to the latest news by the alliance, the World Tourism Museum, an important part of the headquarters, is basically completed while yet to put into use.

The World Tourism Alliance has 228 members so far - covering tourism companies, airline companies and tourism research institutes - from 42 countries and regions such as the United States and Singapore. It has made efforts of promoting international cooperation in tourism and tourism-driven poverty reduction work in the world in past five years since its establishment in 2017.