Beijing seeks investment for tourism

Beijing will further encourage private capital to boost the city's tourism, officials said on Wednesday.

The city will use the social investment to tap into Beijing's tourism potential, as it has recently been nominated as a pilot region for comprehensive tourism reform.

Beijing is the fifth city to be nominated as a pilot city to undergo fundamental and comprehensive reform in tourism development, following Chengdu, Qinhuangdao, Zhoushan and Zhangjiajie.

"As a pilot city, it's necessary to mobilize social resources and private capital to help develop tourism," Lu Yong, director of the Beijing Tourism Development Committee, said on Wednesday.

He said Beijing will continue introducing policies and regulations to allow more capital from the private sectors, domestic or abroad, to help speed up tourism reform.

The attempt to make Beijing a pilot city of comprehensive tourism reform is to satisfy the growing tourism demands from the public, said Zhou Jiucai, deputy director of the policies and law department under the National Tourism Administration.

The capital now invests about 1 billion yuan ($160 million) every year into promoting the city as a tourist destination, according to the Beijing Tourism Development Committee.

Zhang Hui, a professor of tourism at Beijing Jiaotong University, said the private sector has been contributing tremendously to the country's tourism development, and Beijing's plan to further encourage private capital will be a boost for tourism.

As the real estate industry is not as strong as it was years ago, many investors are turning to the development of scenic spots, including investing in local attractions and setting up theme parks, Zhang said.

However, compared with domestic private capital, foreign capital has so far been restricted to the hotel industry, Zhang said.

"It's necessary to deepen the reform to absorb more private investment for the development of the city's tourism," he said.

According to the Beijing Tourism Development Committee, the tourism sector has contributed greatly to the capital's economic development over the past few years.

By the end of 2011, the added value of tourism in the city accounted for 7.4 percent of local gross domestic product, with its new added value contributing some 10 percent to the year's economic growth, according to the statistics of the committee.

Tourist shopping and accommodation accounts for 24.7 percent of retail sales of social consumer goods and the investment of tourism related industry accounts for 9.1 percent of the city's investment in fixed assets, according to the committee.

zhengxin@chinadaily.com.cn