Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, Inc. (NYSE: HOT) announces the grand opening of the largest dedicated hotel customer contact centre in China: Starwood Customer Contact Center in Guangzhou.
“Starwood Hotels & Resorts continues to remain bullish on our long term growth opportunities in markets around the world. Today, China has the largest pipeline of new Starwood hotels outside of North America and continues to be a key growth engine for Starwood. There is tremendous potential for us in both domestic and international travel,” said Michael English, Vice president, Customer Contact Centers …

Malaysia has not changed its target of attracting one million tourists from China to its shores this year despite the current global economic crisis and Influenza A(H1N1) which has also spread to this country.
Tourism Minister Datuk Seri Dr Ng Yen Yen said although the number of H1N1 cases had increased, the ministry was confident that the target made early this year could still be reached due to its continuous promotional campaigns.
“Tourists from China are a big contributor to Malaysia’s tourism industry where 949,845 came here last year compared to 260,083 …

Japan now works with Baidu to promote Japan travel online. The deal issaid to be over one million yuan.
There are about one million Chinese travelling to Japan every year. Japan tourism board starts promoting Japan travel to Chinese, giving individual travel visa to affluent Chinese in Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou from this July.
Japanese travel to China looks set to rebound in the months ahead as travel agency bookings surge, according to Travel Journal International (TJI) Online*. According to figures from the Japan Association of Travel Agents (JATA) quoted by TJI Online, …

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Press conference for the 24th Statistical Report on Internet Development in China

The 24th Statistical Report on Internet Development in China (Report) published by China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC) on July 16 shows that by June 30, 2009, China had remained ahead in three indicators-number of Internet users (338 million), number of broadband users (320 million) and registration volume of top-level domain names (12.96 million), with the popularization rate of the Internet rising steadily. Affected by the launch of 3G …

Hotels, Fashion Brands Becoming Increasingly Global; Competing with Well-Established Foreign Brands In Chinese Market

Chinese luxury brand Liwai has gained recognition over the last 10 years — Will it eventually learn how to appeal to consumers at home and abroad?
Home-grown Chinese luxury brands have been in the news a lot lately, with articles focusing on how their “Chinese flavor” is transitioning from a liability into a selling point. As Chinese consumers have opened up to global brands — and increasingly taken them for granted in some cosmopolitan centers — a space …

Eight in ten Chinese interested in travel “abroad”
Hongkong the NO.1 destination, but Chinese travelers now setting sights on Taiwan.

Despite a global economic downturn that has been impacting China since late 2008, Chinese consumers continue to show strong interest in traveling outside China in 2009, according to the latest China Outbound Travel Monitor from The Nielsen Company.
The latest Nielsen Outbound Travel Monitor reveals that the majority (85%) of Chinese travelers will ‘definitely’ or ‘probably’ travel outside China within the next 12 months, either for leisure or business. Conducted in January and …

THE visiting Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of South Pacific Travel (SPT) Tony Everett says China is one of the growing tourism markets in the world which Solomon Islands can tap into.

South Pacific Travel is the regional body that deals with the tourism industry through marketing and developing of tourism.
Mr Everett was in Honiara on Thursday and spoke on the impact of the economic turndown on tourism and the potential tourism markets abroad.
He said although Solomon Islands does not have any diplomatic ties with mainland China there is a potential that …

In view of the vast size and complexity of the China consumer market, the most successful consumer product companies will be those with a highly detailed understanding of the marketplace and the nature of consumers’ behavior and preferences in different geographies and demographic groups. To develop granular insights on the evolution of Chinese consumers, McKinsey Insights China has been conducting an annual study since 2005. Combining data from the 2009 annual survey, which covered 15,000 Chinese households in 58 cities, and McKinsey Global Institute’s study on China’s urbanization, Insights China …

Wu Wenxue, deputy director of the China National Tourism Association, says China’s outbound tourism is changing the business patterns of the world’s tourism industry.
Wu made the remarks to local media, and he says China has become the fastest growing tourist export country in Asia and China’s rapid growing outbound tourism has increased attention from destinations across the world. The latest statistics show that China’s outbound tourism created a new record in 2006 with a total of 34.52 million outbound tourists. In the first three months of this year, the country …

One of my foreign friends want to improve his Chinese. actually, he can speak smooth and frequent PuTongHua now. but his reading and writing skills are not that good. I think most of Chinese can recognize he is not a native Chinese speaker from his writing materials. and he cant understand exactly what the Chinese’ real meaning is sometimes. So he let me be his Chinese teacher. Then I became his teacher, this happened 2 years ago. It is different now, I believe his spoken Chinese will impressed every Chinese. …

To attract more Chinese tourists to visit Thailand, the country plans to extend the previous three-month-long visa free policy for foreign tourists to the end of the year: a saving of CNY230 for each visa application.
Until December 31, 2009, each tourist will also get travel insurance for USD10,000. If tourists get hurt during political demonstrations or riots their medical and hospitalization costs can be offset by the USD10,000 insurance. If tourists are stranded due to airport closure, all the lodging, dining, and traffic costs during their extended stay can also …

A group of leading Chinese travel agents arrived in Ireland last week, on a fact-finding visit.  The group of influential agents was carefully selected by Tourism Ireland in China and brought here to experience at first-hand our wonderful landscape and visitor attractions.  One of the highlights of their itinerary, put together by Fáilte Ireland, was a guided tour of Birr Castle.
Susan Li, Tourism Ireland China, said: “We are delighted to bring these travel agents to Birr Castle and to Co Offaly.  There is increasing awareness of the island of Ireland …

Fiji should maintain its unique authentic cultural values to capture tourists from the Asian market, especially China.
Beijing-based Pacific Islands Forum Trade Office representative spoke to South Pacific suggested Pacific Island nations should come under one umbrella to be known as the South Pacific to be recognised by the Chinese tourists.
“It is hard for Chinese tourist to locate the countries individually, but to entice them we need to market the whole of the South Pacific since we have one common factor, that is our uniqueness through the various cultures heritage,” he …

Langham Hotels International will invest more than USD 1 billion in China over the next five years to set up 15 hotels. It will expand in the country mainly through its two upscale brands, Langham Place and the Langham. The company intends to enter Chinese cities, such as Hangzhou, Suzhou, Xiamen, Chongqing and Chengdu.
Previously, Langham Hotels launched a boutique hotel in Shanghai under the Langham brand; it was the first five-star boutique hotel in China. There are plans to open two more hotels in Beijing in 2010 and one in …

MySpace China recently launched micro-blogging site 9911.com. It allows posting with each no more than 140 characters by 9911.com, mobile site, desktop software, MSN robot, and SMS.
Source: China Internet Watch (June 5, 2009)

Cook Islands Foreign Minister Wilkie Rasmussen will has said the Pacific island nation will open a representative office in China in August.
Rasmussen made the announcement on Wednesday after he introduced Leon Xu to cabinet as the newly appointed honorary consul to China’s eastern coastal city of Qingdao, the Cook Islands News reported on Thursday.
Xu is a New Zealand citizen and businessman based in Manukau City with interests in China and New Zealand.
The Cook Islands cabinet approved Xu’s appointment about two weeks ago. Rasmussen said a dedicated Cook Islands office in …

China’s New Tang Dynasty Television has obtained a list of the words censored by Baidu.com, China’s largest search engine, according to reports in The Epoch Times.
The list contains thirteen categories of politically sensitive words, including those related to counterrevolutionary activities, human rights and appeals, the Tiananmen Square Massacre, Falun Gong, ethnic relations, military secrets, and organ harvesting.
The phrase “Chinese Communist Party” tops the list of censored search terms. Other censored phrases include “end the rule of the Communist Party,” “dictatorship,” “one-party system,” “human rights in China,” “tyranny,” “ruling government,” and “brainwashing.”
Despite …