（Source: "Economic Daily" 2026-02-27）
On February 27, the fifth issue of the "Economic Daily" think tank report (the 53rd issue in total) published the research results on culture and tourism of the capital's high-end think tank of the w88 casino. The report was written by Wu Chengzhong, Li Xuefei, and Miao Meijuan, teachers from the w88 casino of Government. The following is the content of the article.
Promoting the deeply integrated development of culture and tourism is a major decision made by the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping as the core. It is of great significance to meeting the people's needs for a better life, empowering economic and social development, and building a cultural and tourism power. Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, my country has promoted the interconnection of market factors in the field of culture and tourism. New models and new business formats for the integrated development of culture and tourism have continued to emerge, and the cultural and tourism market has continued to prosper. In view of the existing problems such as fierce homogeneous competition, low integration levels, and weak integration benefits, we must adhere to the priority of protection, rational development, and sustainable utilization, use culture to shape tourism, use tourism to promote culture, and take multiple measures to promote the broader, deeper, and higher-level integrated development of culture and tourism.
Integration of culture and tourism empowers economic and social development
In the early days of reform and opening up, the tourism industry was given the function of earning foreign exchange, focusing on facility construction and scenic spot development, while cultural undertakings were mainly responsible for public service functions. The mutual promotion of culture and tourism is mainly reflected in the initial utilization of resources, that is, using cultural relics, historic sites, and scenic spots as the core attractions of tourism activities. There is a lack of overall planning and systematic planning in administrative management, and there are problems such as a limited scope of cooperation and an unsmooth cooperation mechanism. As residents’ spending power increases, it is difficult for a single sightseeing tour to meet the growing market demand. In 2009, the "Guiding Opinions on Promoting the Integrated Development of Culture and Tourism" was released, arranging the working mechanism for the integration of culture and tourism.
Entering a new era, culture and tourism are moving from industrial collaboration to institutional integration, and are gradually developing towards in-depth integration. In 2016, the State Council issued the "Thirteenth Five-Year Plan for Tourism Development" to expand new areas of tourism development and propose "promoting the integrated development of tourism and culture." After the establishment of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism in 2018, the integration of culture and tourism has taken a substantial step in the institutional mechanism. It adheres to the principle of "integration when appropriate and integration when possible", and the cross-field resource allocation and comprehensive management capabilities have been significantly improved. The tourism market ushered in rapid development in 2019. The number of domestic tourists throughout the year was 6.006 billion, a year-on-year increase of 8.4%; domestic tourism revenue was 5.73 trillion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 11.7%. Since then, affected by the COVID-19 epidemic, the cultural tourism industry has suffered a great impact and has been exploring new paths for integration amid difficulties. The report of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China proposed to promote the in-depth integrated development of culture and tourism. The integration of the two is not a simple institutional integration, but a full-chain, all-factor, all-round deep integration to achieve two-way promotion. On the one hand, cultural content and digital creativity are used to enhance the connotation and core competitiveness of tourism products, and culture can be used to shape tourism; on the other hand, tourism scenes and consumption spaces are used to carry cultural expressions and cultural experiences, and tourism is promoted to promote culture. The "Decision of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Further Comprehensively Deepening Reform and Promoting Chinese-style Modernization" passed by the Third Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China proposed to "improve the system and mechanism for the in-depth integrated development of culture and tourism", which provided guidance for further comprehensively deepening reforms in the cultural and tourism field.
The cultural industry and tourism industry penetrate and integrate with each other to promote the optimization and upgrading of the industrial structure, form new growth points, and further increase the contribution rate to the development of the national economy. In 2024, the added value of the national cultural and related industries was 6,209.4 billion yuan, accounting for 4.61% of the GDP; the added value of the national tourism and related industries was 5,863.1 billion yuan, accounting for 4.35% of the GDP, an increase of 0.11 percentage points from the previous year. New forms of cultural and tourism integration are booming, promoting the overall recovery of the cultural and tourism market. In 2024, domestic residents will travel 5.62 billion times, with a total travel expenditure of 5.8 trillion yuan; the cultural and tourism industry carriers continue to expand and upgrade. By the end of 2024, there will be 16,541 A-level tourist attractions across the country, receiving 6.76 billion tourists throughout the year, with total revenue of 481.42 billion yuan. According to the statistical results of the domestic travel sample survey, domestic residents will travel 6.522 billion times in 2025, and the total travel expenditure will be 6.30 trillion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 16.2% and 9.5% respectively. At the same time, culture and tourism are integrated into new urbanization, comprehensive rural revitalization, and coordinated regional development, driving the commerce, manufacturing, agriculture, sports, transportation and other industries to unleash their vitality and effectively empowering economic and social development.
There are multiple factors behind the integrated development of culture and tourism. First, economic transformation and upgrading bring important opportunities. Entering the stage of high-quality development, the marginal benefits of the development model driven by land finance and high-intensity investment have weakened, and the role of service consumption in stabilizing growth has become more prominent. The cultural tourism industry has driven the development of accommodation, catering, commerce and retail, digital content and other industries with its strong correlation, and the multiplier effect is obvious. At the same time, the integration of culture and tourism uses scene reconstruction to revitalize existing space, which can effectively promote urban renewal, renovation of old neighborhoods and reuse of inefficient assets, becoming an important starting point for stimulating domestic demand. The second is to adapt to the needs of residents’ consumption structure upgrade. Cultural and tourism integration creates diversified, personalized and high-quality cultural and tourism products through product fusion and business format integration to continuously meet differentiated market demands and people’s growing needs for a better life. With the improvement of service quality and the innovation of cultural experience, tourists have shifted from sightseeing to cultural appreciation, and from check-in tours to in-depth tours. The connotation and quality of tourism have continued to improve, and people's satisfaction and happiness have continued to increase. The third is the need to promote the “going out” of Chinese culture. As the influence of Chinese cultural brands continues to increase and residents’ consumption structure continues to optimize, the demand for inbound and outbound tourism is growing. Promote the integrated development of culture and tourism, create cultural and tourism IP with international recognition, while showing the charm of Chinese culture to inbound tourists, and integrate Chinese elements into the global tourism market through international cultural and tourism cooperation projects. In the process of two-way integration, we will promote Chinese culture to the world and continuously enhance the influence of Chinese culture.
Differentiated exploration to improve the efficiency of cultural tourism integration
As the integration of culture and tourism continues to deepen, most provinces have issued relevant policy documents to promote "culture and tourism + all industries" and "all industries + culture and tourism", promote the integrated development of cultural and sports tourism, cultural and commercial tourism, agricultural and cultural tourism, etc., cultivate integrated business formats such as industrial tourism, sports tourism, eco-tourism, and health and wellness tourism, explore differentiated development models, and continuously release the effectiveness of cultural and tourism integration.
First, revitalize existing assets and turn the “industrial rust belt” into a “life show belt.” This model is often used in areas where industrial development started early, has usable industrial heritage, and needs urban renewal and industrial transformation, especially in the eastern region where the cultural tourism consumer market is mature and where scientific and technological innovation and cultural and creative resources are concentrated. Mainly relying on existing assets such as industrial heritage, we promote cultural tourism integration and urban renewal through functional replacement and value reconstruction. Take Beijing's Shougang Park as an example. This old industrial zone founded in 1919 took the opportunity of the Winter Olympics to reuse industrial relics such as iron-making blast furnaces and cooling towers through protective development, and relied on cultural IP to create new scenes such as a science fiction park. In 2024, the number of visitors to the park will exceed 13 million. In the first half of 2025, the number of visitors to the park will exceed 6.65 million, a year-on-year increase of 17%, driving consumption of approximately 260 million yuan.
The second is to use content IP as a traction, shifting from “viewing the scenery” to “entering the drama”. Regions with profound cultural heritage and unique cultural resources will pay more attention to deeply exploring local culture to create original IP, allowing tourists to feel the charm of culture in an immersive experience, while improving the play experience while injecting new vitality into scenic spots, and promoting the development of the cultural tourism industry in a higher-quality and more creative direction. "Only Henan Drama Fantasy City" located in Zhongmu County, Zhengzhou City, Henan Province will be open to the public in 2021. It covers an area of 622 acres and has 21 theaters nested in it. It uses drama to nourish and spread culture, and uses the concept of tourism to attract and serve audiences. As of the end of 2024, it has attracted more than 40 million viewers, of which nearly 80% are from outside the province and 85% are "post-85s" viewers. It has been selected as a national pilot program for cultivating new smart tourism immersive experience spaces.
The third is to enhance the attractiveness of rural areas through event empowerment. Underdeveloped areas, especially key counties in rural revitalization in the western region, actively revitalize rural resources, create new scenes based on local folk culture, promote the deep integration of "event economy" and "cultural tourism consumption", and leverage incremental consumption at lower costs. Rongjiang County in Guizhou Province has deeply integrated Dong, Miao and other ethnic cultures with the "Village Super" competition, transforming the original rural life into a cultural and tourism consumption scene with great on-site intensity. Since the "Village Super" was held, the county has received a total of more than 27 million tourists, and the comprehensive tourism revenue has exceeded 30 billion yuan.
The fourth is to protect ancient cities and towns and build a diversified industrial ecology. The Yangtze River Delta and other eastern regions rely on their profound historical heritage to extend the cultural tourism industry chain and build a comprehensive industrial ecology integrating leisure vacations, business exhibitions, and cultural festivals. Tongxiang City, Zhejiang Province uses local element endowments to develop and operate Wuzhen tourism, explores a development model that integrates heritage protection with fashion creativity, and combines sightseeing experience with quality vacations. During development and construction, it restores the old and protects historical relics. At the same time, it introduces multiple business formats to create rich scenes, forming a differentiated layout of "East Gate Sightseeing, West Gate Vacation". In 2025, Wuzhen will host more than 700 exhibitions, competitions and shows, and receive more than 10 million tourists, providing experience that other regions can learn from when building ancient cities and towns.
The fifth is to integrate digital technology and make good use of historical and cultural heritage. The Guanzhong region, which has profound traditional cultural heritage and rich historical and cultural heritage, is empowered by digital technology to transform cultural heritage from static protection to dynamic interpretation, and historical and cultural resources can be integrated and presented in tourism scenes. Taking the Tang Dynasty Evernight City in Xi'an as an example, this block takes the culture of the prosperous Tang Dynasty as the main line and creates a "Dream Back to the Tang Dynasty" scene through naked-eye 3D, immersive performances and other methods. It will receive 74.75 million tourists in 2024, of which tourists from outside the province account for more than 75%, and overnight tourists account for more than 70%. It has activated the city's cultural tourism consumption potential and promoted the coordinated development of catering, accommodation, transportation and other related industries.
The path of cultural and tourism integration from an international perspective
Cultural tourism has the characteristics of creativity, relevance, sustainability and other characteristics, and has an obvious comprehensive driving effect on economic and social development. From a global perspective, many countries attach great importance to the development of cultural tourism and have formed some unique integrated development models of culture and tourism based on their own cultural resource endowments and economic and social development characteristics.
Enhance cultural soft power through creative drive and brand activities. European countries represented by France and Italy generally focus on the innovative transformation and brand operation of cultural resources. They revitalize various cultural heritages by creating cultural IP and planning special brand activities, reconstruct urban public cultural spaces, and promote the in-depth integration of art and tourism. For example, France has created cultural tourism IP through the "Cultural Capital" project and the Avignon Theater Festival, reconstructing urban public spaces into immersive art scenes. At the same time, it has accurately transformed abandoned castles, stations and other relics into museums and cultural tourism centers. In conjunction with activities such as "European Cultural Heritage Day", it has greatly expanded the time and space boundaries of cultural tourism consumption.
Revitalize historical and cultural resources through social governance. This model builds a social governance system with the participation of multiple subjects, gives full play to the role of social forces such as private capital, public welfare organizations, and community members, strengthens the excavation and utilization of cultural heritage, and promotes urban renewal and cultural tourism economic development while inheriting cultural heritage. Countries and regions such as the United Kingdom and Germany have explored and formed new sustainable development paths for cultural tourism. The UK has established a social welfare management mechanism represented by the "National Trust" and transformed historical monuments into community-shared cultural living rooms through a huge network of volunteers. It has effectively expanded the depth of tourism experience while easing the financial pressure on the government. At the same time, through the "Heritage + Creativity + Community" model, we will strengthen the reuse of industrial heritage such as the London Riverside Power Station and Liverpool's Albert Dock to drive the development of the local tourism economy.
Use artistic intervention to open up market space for rural areas. This model focuses on issues such as rural hollowing out and regional development imbalances, and creates distinctive cultural tourism IP through the cross-border integration of modern art with local natural landscapes, folk culture, and rural resources to stimulate the vitality of rural development. South Korea, Japan, Vietnam and other East and Southeast Asian countries have effectively explored this aspect. Taking South Korea as an example, Gasiri Village on Jeju Island launched a new cultural space creation project to attract artists to create in the village and transform the traditional agricultural production space into a rural art gallery with both ecological aesthetics and experiential value. Gamcheon-dong Cultural Village in Busan established an operating association through community residents, local civil servants, artists, etc. to coordinate the renovation project and transform abandoned houses into art workshops, miniature museums and other scenes. It successfully attracted a large number of young people to return home to start businesses, and promoted the development of the agricultural, cultural and tourism industry. The village was named "Asia's Most Beautiful Village" at the 2012 Asian Urban Landscape Award Ceremony.
Weak points still need to be accurately addressed
The integrated development of culture and tourism in my country has achieved remarkable results. However, in practice, there are still shortcomings in product innovation, factor supply, investment efficiency, institutional mechanisms, etc., resulting in insufficient integration depth and insufficient integration benefits.
The creative transformation ability is weak and the local cultural value is not deeply explored. In the practice of promoting the integrated development of culture and tourism, the phenomenon of “one thousand towns and one thousand scenes is the same” is relatively common. Some places create a cultural atmosphere through antique buildings, performing arts exhibitions, etc., but lack an in-depth review of the historical context. Cultural tourism projects lack solid narrative construction, emotional resonance and scene innovation, making it difficult to form lasting appeal. The important reason is that business entities tend to be short-sighted, utilitarian, and quick in the development of cultural resources, and the insufficient use of digital technology leads to a mismatch between product supply and market demand, making it difficult to create differentiated competitiveness and long-term influence, and cultural resources cannot be effectively transformed into industrial value.
The supply of factors is insufficiently adapted, and the industrial development support system needs to be improved. The lack of comprehensive talent reserves and the lack of cross-border talents proficient in cultural planning, market operations, and digital technology have restricted the innovative development of cultural tourism products. Digital operation capabilities lag behind, and the level of big data insights, user portrait analysis, precision marketing, and traffic refinement operations is low, and it is unable to efficiently match the stratified, personalized, and quality consumption needs of tourists. The profit model is relatively single, over-reliance on the ticket economy, insufficient extension of the consumption chain, slow iteration of content supply, short product life cycles, and the overall industry's ability to resist risks is weak.
The emphasis is on construction but not on operation, and the problem of inefficient investment is prominent. Some places equate tourism development with real estate development and project construction, ignoring that the essence of cultural tourism projects is to rely on long-term operations and content innovation and iteration to continuously obtain cash flow. The lack of long-term operational planning and business logic support has led to products being separated from the market, capital investment and market demand being seriously out of touch, and falling into debt crisis and development difficulties.
There is insufficient cross-departmental collaboration, and the integrated development system and mechanism need to be improved. The national level and various provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities have completed the integration of cultural and tourism administrative departments and streamlined the industry management and service systems and mechanisms. However, there are still problems such as blurred functional boundaries between various departments and incomplete resource coordination and sharing mechanisms. The cost of cross-department communication and coordination is high and the linkage efficiency is low, resulting in the slow progress of some projects in planning approval, resource allocation, policy implementation and other aspects, affecting the effectiveness of policy implementation.
Multiple parties work together to promote better integration
In recent years, digital technology represented by artificial intelligence has been iteratively upgraded and widely used, injecting new impetus into the innovation of cultural tourism formats; residents’ consumption structure continues to improve, and demand for quality and immersive experiences is strong, bringing new increments to industry development; the global cultural tourism market is accelerating its recovery, and cross-border exchanges have unleashed huge consumption potential. The “15th Five-Year Plan” recommendations emphasize “promoting the in-depth integration of culture and tourism, vigorously developing cultural tourism, and empowering economic and social development with culture.” To promote the broader, deeper and higher-level integrated development of culture and tourism, precise efforts must be made from the aspects of content supply, technological empowerment, and collaborative governance.
Resolve the dilemma of homogeneity with high-quality cultural content. Cultural content is the core of cultural and tourism integration. It is necessary to abandon the traditional path of scale expansion, insist on content being king, and build a solid foundation for tourism development with high-quality cultural IP. Stimulate the vitality of cultural innovation, set up special support funds to focus on supporting original IPs that embody the essence of Chinese culture and have strong market appeal, increase the protection of intellectual property rights, and encourage cultural and tourism enterprises to cooperate in depth with professional teams to create high-quality immersive products. Implementing the differentiated development strategy of “one city, one policy”, each region relies on its own cultural resources to explore local historical context and folk customs, avoid duplication of construction, and create a recognizable cultural tourism IP.
Technological empowerment reshapes the cultural tourism ecology. Technology is an important driving force in promoting the integration of culture and tourism. It is necessary to accelerate the application of new technologies such as artificial intelligence in the field of culture and tourism, develop new business formats characterized by intelligent interaction and immersive experience, and further enrich the cultural and tourism ecology. Strengthen the construction of digital infrastructure, establish Internet of Things and big data platforms in key scenic spots and cultural districts, and improve the level of refinement and intelligence in operation management. Strengthen the digital protection and utilization of cultural heritage, carry out high-precision collection and modeling of cultural relics, monuments, and intangible cultural heritage skills, use VR/AR technology to create immersive experience scenes, and build a new model of cultural and tourism integration. Transform and upgrade traditional cultural and tourism consumption sites, cultivate new formats such as digital cultural tourism, and stimulate new potential for cultural tourism consumption.
Improving institutional mechanisms and guarantee systems. In view of the characteristics of cultural tourism projects such as large investment, long cycle and high risk, a stable factor guarantee mechanism should be built to correct the tendency of "emphasis on construction and neglect of operation". Innovate financial support models, establish relevant industrial investment funds, promote the implementation of REITs in the cultural and tourism field, revitalize high-quality existing assets, reduce project debt risks, and support policies such as tax exemptions and discounted loans to guide the in-depth participation of social capital. Improve the reward and subsidy mechanism, set up special funds and focus on cultural and tourism integration projects with significant social benefits. Improve risk prevention and control mechanisms and introduce insurance products such as business interruption insurance to disperse operational risks caused by emergencies. Establish and improve the performance evaluation and exit mechanism, reorganize or exit projects with long-term losses and no hope of rectification in accordance with the law, incorporate investment benefits and risk prevention and control of cultural tourism projects into the performance assessment scope of leading cadres, and guide rational decision-making.
Coordinate and collaborate to build an integrated development pattern. Promoting the integration of culture and tourism is a systematic project that involves multiple fields and departments. It is necessary to break down fragmentation and strengthen collaborative governance. Promote the establishment of a cross-department joint meeting system in various localities, conduct regular consultations, solve problems such as poor policy connection and resource allocation difficulties, and achieve integrated operations of planning preparation, capital investment, and project promotion. Accelerate the improvement of supporting standards and specifications for local cultural and tourism integration, establish a unified industry statistical indicator system, break down departmental data barriers, promote information exchange and sharing and regulatory coordination, and form an integrated development pattern of efficient linkage and collaborative efforts.
(Written by: Wu Chengzhong, Li Xuefei, Miao Meijuan)
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