China's travel explosion
Posted: Wednesday, July 11, 2007 2:29 PM
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Beijing, China
By Ed Flanagan, NBC News Researcher
We were only two days into our work trip to Yunnan province and I was looking for a way out.
Without a doubt, the scenery was a visual feast. Perched high atop Tiger Leaping Gorge – a stunning natural site formed between the Jade Dragon Snow and Haba Snow Mountains – we were treated to breathtaking views of snow-capped mountains and lightly forested hillsides dotted by picturesque terraced farm plots.
Far below us, the Jinsha River lazily wound off into the distant horizon. The price for these beautiful views though? Thin air.
VIDEO: The treacherous trip up to Tiger Leaping Gorge
With the cliffs starting at 6,600 feet and my lungs and head already working hard to cope with the load of our camera gear, I was anxious to get back to the gorge base to give my body a break.
But a half-mile from the park's entrance, everything came to a standstill as we ran right smack into a traffic jam that rivaled anything we had ever seen in Beijing.
Blocking our exit from the park were two converging caravans of tour buses and private cars vying for access along the same narrow two-lane path carved out of the side of the cliff. At the center of this honking cacophony of mayhem was one lone tour bus whose nervous looking driver was attempting an absurdly difficult 10-point turn before an audience of hundreds of irate tourists.
As if on cue, a shirtless old man walked by our van and jovially told us, "You aren't going anywhere, there are buses backed up almost two kilometers [over a mile] from here! This place is so popular now, it's always like this ..."
Flexing new travel muscles
China's travel explosion is a recent phenomenon that coincides with a robust economy and the subsequent growth of middle-class incomes. Much like the travel explosion in America during the 1950s, Chinese are beginning to flex their newly discovered disposable income to travel the country and, increasingly, the world. In 2006, a record 124 million mainland Chinese traveled domestically.
Interestingly, The Standard, a Hong Kong newspaper, reported last month that according to the China National Tourism Administration, Chinese currently make only one domestic trip a year (as opposed to Americans who travel on average seven times a year), but that number will probably rise to two trips a year within the next decade – or 2.6 billion trips.
Important cultural and ecological sites such as Tiger Leaping Gorge have seen a 30 percent increase in Mainland Chinese visitors anxious to take in the stunning views and minority cultures that dot the region.
Protected sites?
Tiger Leaping Gorge has been listed as a World Heritage site by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) since July 2003, thanks to its location in the larger "Three Parallel Rivers of Yunan Protected Areas," an ecological haven for countless rare species.
Ostensibly the World Heritage designation should preserve the area from overdevelopment or destruction, but the rising number of tourists has sparked increased concern amongst experts over the stability of the area's delicate ecology and culture.
Further complicating matters is persistent discussion by the local provincial government about constructing a hydroelectric dam on the Jinsha River that would flood Tiger Leaping Gorge and displace more than 80,000 people of varying minority groups in an infrastructure program that would rival the famous Three Gorges Dam in size.
While UNESCO status is meant to protect areas like Tiger Leaping Gorge from this very sort of development, through some clever bureaucratic maneuvering the Yunnan provincial government has quietly attempted to create an exception for Tiger Leaping Gorge, essentially allowing the government to construct the dam there and still abide by the letter, if not the spirit of the UNESCO guidelines.
While the national government (which often operates at odds with the local provincial governments) has repeatedly announced there would be no dam construction on Tiger Leaping Gorge, it has not prevented provincial officials from going so far as to drill numerous exploratory tunnels into the gorge's face to test its ability to handle the flooding that would come with the dam's construction.
Bigger numbers expected
Whatever the government plans to do to help limit the ecological and societal damages caused by tourism, it better get going soon. The U.N. World Tourism Organization predicts that China could very well surpass Spain as the second most popular destination after France by 2010.
Beijing alone – the host for the 2008 Summer Olympics – is expecting to have over 4.4 million overseas and 150 million domestic tourists.
With the influx of more moneyed tourists into these areas, the national government will likely face greater pressure to intervene on behalf of local governments who themselves are conflicted by the need to provide economic opportunities for farmers who are increasingly being left behind in this new China.
