Yangzhou tourism sees huge growth in first eight months

Tourists take sightseeing boats on the Slender West Lake, one of the most famous attractions in Yangzhou. [Photo/yznews.com.cn]

Yangzhou saw significant year-on-year growth in income from tourism and tourist numbers in the first eight months of 2018, according to statistics released on Oct 9.

During the first eight months, Yangzhou's tourism income was 61.1 billion yuan ($8.81 billion), a year-on-year growth of 15 percent.

A total of 46.97 million domestic tourists, along with 47,000 international tourists, visited Yangzhou, up 12 percent and 21.9 percent year-on-year. One of the key reasons for the rapid growth in tourism is Yangzhou's continuous efforts in integrating tourism with other industries such as agriculture, industry and culture.

As the host city of two large-scale sports events, namely the 19th Sports Games of Jiangsu and the Jianzhen International Half Marathon, Yangzhou saw over 20,000 attendees of the competitions visiting the city, which helped to contribute significantly to local tourism.

Moreover, in the summer Yangzhou launched the 2018 Summer Parent-Child Study project, helping to make full use of the tourism resources in the off season and breaking a new record for tourist numbers in the summer.