China to face $100b tourism deficit

BEIJING - China is set to see its tourism deficit exceed $100 billion this year as Chinese traveling overseas spend much more than foreign visitors back home, according to a report by the China Tourism Academy (CTA).

"A tourism deficit greater than $100 billion is a sure thing this year," said CTA president Dai Bin, citing explosive growth in outbound tourists and a lackluster inbound tourism market.

About 116 million Chinese are expected to travel and spend $155 billion overseas in 2014, up 20 percent from a year ago, Dai said.

China has become the world's main source of international tourists in recent years, as a richer middle class seeks more exotic experiences overseas, said the report, released on Monday.

The expected net tourism deficit reflects the increasing purchasing power of Chinese abroad, as they tend to open their wallets generously in European cities such as Paris and London to buy luxury goods from branded bags to expensive wrist watches.

Last year, per capita spending by Chinese traveling overseas was almost three times the amount foreign visitors spent in China, according to Fan Zhiyong, an associate professor under the School of Economics with the Renmin University.

Chinese tourists made a total of 98.2 million trips overseas last year, climbing 18 percent from a year earlier, according to the China National Tourism Administration.

For the first half of 2014, the administration estimated that Chinese spent more than $70 billion on their overseas trips during the period, up 20.7 percent year on year.

As Chinese spend more time and money overseas, competition to attract them is intensifying among foreign countries.

Currently, Chinese can travel to 151 countries for tourism purposes, with Senegal becoming the latest destination under a memorandum of understanding between the two countries this month.

India is also preparing to launch a tourism promotion campaign in Chinese media in the coming months, while introducing audio recordings in Mandarin at popular Indian monuments.

China first recorded a tourism deficit in 2008, when the global financial crisis greatly discouraged foreign spending in the country while a stronger yuan encouraged tourist outflow.

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