The return of Chinese tourism costs more than expected. The pandemic cut short the upward trend registered by the sweet market – they are the tourists who spend the most when they travel – and the lack of flights and visas conditions its recovery. The announcement of the new connection between Barcelona and Shenzhen, which adds to the three weekly frequencies with Shanghai, is a step towards the recovery of a market that has become a strategic objective.
“Most of the Asian tourists we see now in Barcelona come from Korea,” explains Mateo Asensio, director of promotion at Barcelona Turisme. In this case, the resumption of flights has made it possible to recover, already in April, the figures recorded in 2019. According to the Barcelona Tourism Observatory, Korea is now in position number 12 in terms of hotel occupancy, with 1.4% of total reservations. It is the only Asian country on the list. Not surprisingly, while Korean Air offers four weekly connections and Asiana Airlines adds two more, China maintains only three weekly flights, with the forecast of adding two more weekly flights to Shenzen at the end of the summer.
Another of the Asian countries that have fallen off the list in Barcelona is Japan, with which there is currently no direct flight from Barcelona. “The war in Ukraine forces us to divert flights and the journey is now longer and more expensive”, explains Asensio.
In the case of China, last year Barcelona received only a third of the 181,000 visitors registered in 2019. “The recovery is slow due to the difficulties the country’s citizens have in obtaining visas and because there are no flights, but the market Asians are a main target because they have a cultural motivation and because of their high purchasing power”, says Eduard Torres, president of Turisme de Barcelona.
In terms of spending per Tax Free check, Hong Kong ranks first, with an average of 976 euros, but China is in second place, with 774 euros spent per person per day. In terms of total purchases, Asian visitors spend three times the Barcelona average. “The city’s offer is limited, it cannot grow any more; last year was very good and this year is also being good; what we have to do now is choose the tourism we want, with the United States market very strong – in June it represented 15.6% of hotel occupancy, just below national tourism (19.6%) and above the French (7.4%) and British (7.3%) visitors – we are interested in Asians coming”, insists Torres.
Along these lines are the missions organized throughout this year, first in Hong Kong and Shenzhen, to activate the Asian market after three years of standstill. “No one thought that the effects of the pandemic would last three years. In 2019, 800,000 Chinese tourists visited Spain, and the projections we made for 2020 were 1.2 million visitors”, explains Yu Delong, from the agency Dragon Viajes, which specializes in the Asian market and has more than 20 years of experience in the sector.
This week, twenty of the companies that participated in the Spain-China Tourism Cooperation Forum in Madrid visited Barcelona. In addition to climbing the Glòries tower, walking around Montjuïc, the 22@ or the Passeig de Gràcia, a gala dinner was held at the Arts hotel, with representatives of the restaurant sector, commerce, the Hotel Guild or cultural institutions, such as the Palau de la Música.
Turisme de Barcelona has submitted the candidacy so that the World Travel Alliance (WTA) Forum can be held in Barcelona next year.
