By Yuling Chen

On November 8, 2018, the Forum on the Yangtze River Three Gorges Tourism took place in Wanzhou District, Chongqing Municipality. The forum, its host being the organizing committee of the 9^th China Yangtze River Three Gorges International Tourism Festival, is themed with “New Three Gorges: Pleasure comes from beautiful landscape, good environment goes along with development.

On November 8, 2018, the Forum on the Yangtze River Three Gorges Tourism took place in Wanzhou District, Chongqing Municipality. (Photo by Xie Zhiqiang)

Four tourism experts, Xiao Qianhui, Gao Shunli, Xu Bing, Luo Cibai, delivered keynote speeches on how to promote Three Gorges tourism in tandem with good ecology and green development.

Three Gorges Land Route

With the topic of Further Upgrade of Three Gorges Tourism, Mr. Xiao Qianhui put forward the notion of “Three Gorges Land Route”, which means water and land routes relevant with the Three Gorges are based on local conditions and picked up in a bid to improve and highlight these routes.

Target markets are independent and self-driving tours. It aims to create new form of business operation and explore more popular tourist destinations. He emphasized that Three Gorges Land Route means utility of land resources, improvement of supporting facilities and services, instead of large-scale construction.

The upgrade of Three Gorges tourism requires feasible planning in an international way, he suggested and added that the most beautiful road is a joint effort of experts on self-driving, outdoor sports, travelling companion, photography, planning and local conditions. Along this route, there will be mountains, rivers and villages. Natural resources like clouds, stars and fog, scenic spots and human landscape are feast for your eyes. What’s more, delicious food and beautiful towns are to impress your taste bud. All these for you to see and eat will be integrated with Three Gorges Cruises, tributaries and the land route.

Ecology Priority and Green Development

Gao Shunli attached great importance of “ecology priority and green development”. He proposed the tourism development of the Three Gorges to be market-oriented, in a bid to give a full play of tourism for the Yangtze River Economic Belt. Besides, he stressed featured products and developing tourism consumer goods. He also suggested replaying the charm of Three Gorges tour and promoting the integration of culture and tourism. At the same time, major projects development requires a cautious attitude.

Three Tourism Pluses

Three “tourism pluses”, namely sports + tourism, cruises + derivation” and “culture + technology”, constituted the main idea of the speech delivered by Xu Bing. Mr. Xu said that the Three Gorges represent Chinese treasure and world resource. It is accessible to experience hiking, mountain climbing, skiing, parachuting and other sports tourism items here, based on the natural resources. He suggested to better cruising tour quality by route optimization, facilities improvement, delicious food and interesting activities. Themed derivative products correlate with the Three Gorges, presented with high technology. Experiencing activity containing the cultural elements of the Three Gorges is a suggested way to upgrade the tourism.

Cultural Essence of the Three Gorges

Luo Cibai thought that the core value of Three Gorges contains not only its magnificence and ecology, but also its story. It is about the cultural charm, highlighted by intangible cultural heritage, where core value really lies. But it is also a weak point in terms of current tourism development and utility. Upgrading the Three Gorges tourism is suggested in a soft way, by means of integral image improvement, experience activity as a main part, story telling and advancement with the times.