China logged a welcome uptick in spending on services during the just-concluded eight-day “super golden week” public holiday, as the country’s transport hubs handled record numbers of passengers.
Chinese transport authorities logged 2.432 billion passenger trips – a record high and a 6.2 per cent year-on-year increase – during this year’s extended holiday, which combined the National Day and Mid-Autumn Festival celebrations.
The surge was mainly driven by overlapping demand for tourism and family visits, as well as recent improvements to China’s transport network, the Ministry of Transport said in a statement released on Thursday.
The number of passengers taking rail, air and boat trips rose by 2.6 per cent, 3.4 per cent and 4.2 per cent, respectively, during this year’s golden week, with travel concentrated in urban clusters such as the Yangtze River Delta, Pearl River Greater Bay Area and Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, the ministry said.
Consumers also spent more than last year during the holiday, data from the State Taxation Administration indicated. Daily average sales revenues in consumption-related industries were up 4.5 per cent year on year, according to the latest value-added tax invoice data, the body said.
Spending on services increased by 7.6 per cent compared with the same period last year, while goods sales grew by a more modest 3.9 per cent, according to the data.
