Post-COVID tourism from China comes under spotlight

From left: Sri Lanka Tourism Chairperson Kimarli Fernando, SLAITO President Maahen Kariyawasan, Sri Lankan Ambassador-designate to China Dr.Palitha Kohona, and SriLankan Airlines CEO Vipula Gunatilleka - Pic by Ruwan Walpola 

By Charumini de Silva

How Sri Lanka can woo more Chinese tourists post-COVID-reopening came under the spotlight at an inbound tour operators’ forum this week.

A host of suggestions came from Sri Lankan Ambassador-designate to the People’s Republic of China Dr. Palitha Kohona, Sri Lanka Tourism Chairperson Kimarli Fernando, and SriLankan Airlines CEO Vipula Gunatilleke at a discussion on ‘Post-COVID Tourism from China’ organised by the Sri Lanka Association of Inbound Tour Operators (SLAITO) on Wednesday.

Dr. Kohona said tourism has the potential to be the top foreign exchange earner in the post-COVID economy, adding that he will extend the fullest support to woo more Chinese travellers to visit Sri Lanka.

“As a mission, we will ensure that you have access to the market to the widest extent possible. With your assistance we will work with Chinese tour operators, media channels and other sources,” he added.

Pointing out that 196 million Chinese have travelled the world last year, where 100 million of them had visited only Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau, he said that Sri Lanka has the potential to attract a decent fraction of the remaining 69 million if all stakeholders work collectively.

Among the suggestions Dr. Kohona outlined were greater usage of digital marketing platforms such as social media, tourism-oriented national carrier, and more Chinese-speaking officials and guides.

From a regulator’s perspective, Sri Lanka Tourism Chief Kimarli Fernando said discussions are continuing on the reopening of the airport and recommendations have been presented in a Cabinet paper, but no final decision has been made.

Fernando also said they were working on the issues related to tour guides, assuring that it will be addressed in the near future.

Maintaining that China is one of the key source markets of Sri Lanka, she said it was important to attract Chinese families that prefer longer stays. “Sri Lanka Tourism is working on promoting niche products. We are looking at promoting Buddhist tourism, adventure, wildlife and nature,” Fernando added.   

National carrier SriLankan Airlines CEO Gunatilleke said they have revamped their e-commerce systems, hoping that the airport will be open for all passengers by the first quarter next year to attract Chinese New Year travellers to rebuild the traffic.

“Looking at statistics pre-COVID, China was a totally under-served market. We wanted to double our capacity pre-COVID, but we were looking at more frequencies and fourth and fifth destinations in China. We will not underestimate this market as there are a lot of opportunities. We intend to use our resources to review this market,” Gunatilleka said.

SriLankan Airlines CEO pointed out that getting slots was challenging, and requested the Ambassador designate to China Dr. Kohona to address it going forward.