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Archive for the ‘World Tourism Organization’ Category

In a new sign, which confirms the rise of China as a world superpower, the World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) said yesterday that last year China moved to Spain as the third international destination, a ranking that continues to lead France and the United States.

While the WTO does not yet have definitive numbers, the provisional data from an agency of the UN indicate that China received in 2010 56 million international tourists, compared with 53 million registered Spain in the same period.

Spain, two years ago ranked second in the ranking of most visited countries, again losing out, hit by the crisis, also affected tourism. This year the sector returned to growth after two years of contraction, but not enough to avoid being dislodged from the list in China.

The country ended 2010 with a growth in activity from 12% in a year when the global tourism industry amounted to 935 million tourists, 6.7% more than in 2009, resulting in significant revenue for strings hotels in that country.

“Asia was the first region that managed to recover from the crisis and the fastest growing. Reached a record 204 million arrivals of international flights, announced yesterday the secretary general of UNWTO, Tale Raffia, during the presentation of the interim review of world tourism in 2010.

“Asian countries will continue to be serious competitors in tourism. Not only China, but also particularly China, “he said Raffia.”The world is changing, changing geopolitics; the centers of gravity are changing. We cannot expect that tourism remains alien to those changes, “he said.

The WTO report said the Shanghai Expo as one of the most influential mega-events increase the flow of global tourism over the past year, together with the World Cup in South Africa and the Winter Olympics in Canada.

Shanghai and Hong Kong are the two Chinese cities are more tourists. The following Beijing, where you can find two great icons of international tourism: the Great Wall and Forbidden City.

The Chinese authorities see tourism as a good opportunity to improve the country’s image abroad, after recent scandals over food and product exports in poor condition, and after complaints from other countries for the bad behavior of Chinese tourists abroad.

Days ago, the head of the Chinese National Intelligence Council, Wang Chen, stressed that government efforts to improve tourist services and highlighted the hospitality of the Chinese, in addition to the wide range of cheap hotels across the region.