Under the combination of diverse demands such as returning home for family visits, sightseeing, leisure vacations, and study experiences, the overall recovery momentum of the cultural and tourism market during this year's May Day holiday is strong. The cultural and tourism consumption market presents the characteristics of both supply and demand, and both quantity and quality are rising. The trend of product iteration and upgrading is obvious. In addition, culture has become the core demand of consumption, slow living and deep experience have become mainstream models, and the adjustment of the demand structure for cultural and tourism consumption has become prominent.
Behind the expansion and improvement of the cultural and tourism consumption market, three driving forces can be described. One is the integration of urban and rural areas, with mutual complementarity. The trend of integrating urban and rural consumption spaces is further highlighted, and the dual circulation pattern of cultural and tourism consumption is gradually forming. On the one hand, the return of overseas cultural and tourism consumption has driven the growth of high-end leisure and vacation consumption around large and medium-sized cities, and third - and fourth tier cities have become more and more choices for tourists to travel, objectively providing new opportunities for the improvement and upgrading of rural tourism in China. On the other hand, the rise of the sinking market has provided strong impetus for the accelerated recovery of cultural and tourism consumption.
The second is digital empowerment, breaking through boundaries and exerting force. The application of digital cultural tourism has reshaped the supply-demand interaction in the cultural tourism market and achieved the reconstruction of the ecological environment of the cultural tourism industry. The Cultural and Creative Ice Cream Challenge jointly participated by various regions during the May Day holiday reflects that cultural and tourism consumption is gradually moving towards a closed loop of offline product consumption - online content production - offline marketing feedback - re experience, realizing the flow and dialogue of cultural and tourism elements between different scenic spots, regions, and cultures, and promoting the evolution of small tourism to big platforms and big ecology. In addition, the application of 5G+artificial intelligence, 5G+VR and other technologies in the cultural and tourism industry provides a new path for creating more unique cultural experiences and immersive situations. Through digital empowerment, the cultural and tourism industry is gradually breaking free from the vicious cycle of price wars, and the close interaction between supply and demand is constantly breaking through the circle.
The third is cross industry linkage and scene reshaping. During the May Day holiday, there were about 14000 performances nationwide. Strawberry Music Festival, China-Chic Music Festival and other consumer exhibitions were held all over the country. Animation and game carnivals, auto shows and other consumer exhibitions lit up the festival consumer market. Cultural tourism, performance, research and other forms of business were integrated, reshaping the cultural tourism consumer scene. Driven by culture, art, capital, technology, and creativity, cross industry collaboration enables the continuous iteration and updating of cultural and tourism consumption scenarios, achieving a closer integration of cultural and tourism products with local cultural backgrounds and industrial characteristics, and bringing new momentum to market development.
Behind the recovery and increasing prosperity of the cultural and tourism market is the continuously rising consumer demand. Guiding the extension of the holiday economy towards normalization, promoting the boundarylessness of cultural and tourism consumption space, time flexibility, and the return of humanistic values, is an inevitable requirement for achieving resilience, inclusiveness, and sustainability in China's cultural and tourism consumption, and thus realizing the high-quality development of China's cultural and tourism industry.
Boundless consumer space enhances consumer resilience. Rural tourism and red tourism can be used as entry points to promote the productization, projectization, and industrialization of rural tourism resources, enhance the overall quality of rural spatial cultural and tourism consumption, accelerate the market penetration of tourism e-commerce, guide the transformation of tourism consumption concepts in the third and fourth tier markets, and form a two-way complementary trend. Simultaneously promoting the integration of cultural tourism and tourism culture, leveraging the tourism functions of public cultural facilities such as three museums and one station and enhancing the cultural connotation of tourism infrastructure, creating a composite cultural and tourism space, and improving the consumption carrying capacity of cultural and tourism space. The third is to rely on the construction of national cultural parks, connect spatially dispersed cultural elements with the development of tourism resources, socio-economic development, and cultural undertakings along the route, and promote the cross regional flow of cultural and tourism consumption through the overall excavation and structural integration of cross regional cultural resources. By continuously expanding the space for cultural and tourism consumption, revitalizing the existing stock of cultural and tourism resources, promoting the flow of consumption factors between urban and rural areas, and regions, we can improve the resilience of the cultural and tourism industry, actively integrate into the domestic big cycle, and gradually move towards a more open domestic and international dual cycle.
Elastic consumption time and strengthened inclusiveness. We should accelerate the implementation of the paid vacation system, explore flexible work arrangements, and guide cultural and tourism consumption to move from the current single and centralized consumption to decentralized and fragmented consumption. Through staggered vacations and peak travel, we can continue the vitality of the holiday economy. The rise of Generation Z and the silver hair market has become the main force in off peak travel, but there are significant differences between the two in terms of cultural and tourism products and destination selection. Therefore, it is necessary to increase the supply of customized and refined products based on their demand characteristics, such as integrated products of cultural tourism and ecology, health and wellness, sports and other new formats, intelligent, digital, immersive innovative products, etc.
Return to human centered values and enhance sustainability. The realization of cultural tourism consumption is a return from material oriented to people-oriented. Tourists are no longer simply cultural consumers, but also important participants and contributors to the production and dissemination of cultural tourism content. In the development and design of cultural and tourism products, tourists need to learn, transform, output, and provide feedback to form a closed loop of cultural and tourism consumption. To expand the participation and benefits of communities and local residents in cultural and tourism consumption, making cultural and tourism consumption an economic activity that involves extensive participation, extensive benefits, and extensive sharing. In addition, it is necessary to promote the optimization and integration of cultural and tourism products and services, continuously endow cultural and tourism consumption with new connotations, and strengthen the cultural confidence of tourists and local residents through cultural and tourism consumption, so that more subjects can become disseminators and contributors of excellent traditional culture.
The main points of this article can be found in: Wu Zhicai, Huang Shihui, Zhang Lingyuan Guangming Times Review: New pattern drives expansion and quality improvement of cultural and tourism consumption [EB/OL]. May 20, 2021 [February 22, 2022] https://m.gmw.cn/baijia/2021-05/20/34861697.html