Travel industry innovates to diversify experiences

Yang Jianlin has been riding the wave of the country's recent efforts to boost the "night economy".

His Beijing-based company, Huaying Cultural and Creative Industry Technology, has helped several attractions across the country draw crowds.

"We focus on night tours, health preservation and dining to ensure travelers enjoy our four-hour 'golden' night hours," Yang says.

The company has developed art shows to preserve local folk culture in Hunan province's Zhangjiajie and immersion experiences at Sichuan province's Guangwu Mountain.

The "beer dinner" at Guangwu Mountain has been a hit. The daily income from night dining has surpassed weekly ticket revenues at the site, Yang says.

"We designed many facets of the night-dining experiences, such as telling visitors how to appreciate beer, and how to connect areas' daytime activities and nighttime stories," Yang says.

Huaying launched its Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal night tour during the just-concluded National Day holiday.

In late September, Yang participated in a forum in Hubei province's capital, Wuhan, to seek tourism-innovation opportunities.

Wuhan's government hosted the event to provide new ideas and momentum to enable the city to become a cultural-and green-tourism destination.

The city has adopted special policies to boost the integration of technology, culture and tourism.

Wuhan's Donghu High-Tech Development Zone recently unveiled a three-year plan to develop culture and technology industries.

By 2021, the zone aspires to attract 400 talented people in the fields of culture and technology, and generate 100 billion yuan ($14.1 billion) in cultural-business revenue.

Six ministries and administrations, including the Ministry of Science and Technology, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, and the National Radio and Television Administration, have issued guidance on in-depth integration of culture and technology this year.

The guidance will help upgrade cultural-and technological-innovation capacity, says Culture and Technology Innovation Service Alliance secretary-general Liu Bing.

Culture and tourism currently accounts for 15 percent of GDP, and technological integration will bring tremendous growth, he says.

The alliance has already organized many shows and performances. And it has applied interactive, sound, visual and artificial-and virtual-reality effects to boost the experience-based economy, Liu adds.

The alliance has developed art shows to present the 2,000-year history of Hunan's Dayong ancient town and has applied interactive technology at Anhui province's Huashan Mysterious Grottoes.

The two sites will open to the public at the end of this year.

China has more than 230 cities with populations exceeding 500,000, which makes for a promising market for emerging cultural and tourism consumption, Liu says.