hankyoreh

September 2009. 　

By Kim Jeong-pil, staff reporter

Chinese tourists spent over US$7.5 billion visiting South Korea last year, statistics show.

A report titled “The Industry Effects of the Increase in Chinese Tourism and Policy Suggestions,” published on Aug. 15 by the Korea Institute for Industrial Economics and Trade (KIET), noted that the number of Chinese tourists in South Korea rose from 1,068,000 in 2007 to 4,326,000 in 2013, for an annual average increase of 26.2%.

Indeed, at 35.5% Chinese visitors accounted for the largest percentage of foreign tourists in the country last year.

The amount spent per capita by Chinese tourists also rose 80.0% from US$1,262 in 2008 to US$2,272 in 2013, or roughly 1.3 times the average per capita spending of US$1,684 among all foreign tourists in South Korea that year.

Per capita spending by US tourists rose by just 7.3% between 2008 and 2013, from US$1,370 to US$1,470, while average spending by Japanese tourists dropped 4.2% from US$1,033 in 2008 to just $990 last year.

The total amount spent by Chinese tourists in 2013 was calculated at 7.672 trillion won (US$7.52 billion), or 49% of all spending by foreign tourists. The amount was up by 4.1 times from its 2010 levels.

The production inducement effect on South Korean industry in general from the 2013 spending by Chinese tourists was estimated at 13.37 trillion won (US$13.1 billion), or 2.4 times the 5.58 trillion won (US$5.5 billion) recorded for 2010.

Retail benefited the most in terms of production induced by shopping tourism, with gains of 4.48 trillion won (US$4 billion). Next were the food industry (1.198 trillion won/US$1.17 billion) and hotels (1.183 trillion won/US$1.16 billion).

The KIET report analyzed tourism trends and their economic effects using tourism figures and tourist surveys from the Korea Tourism Organization and Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism.

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