“Tourism is an important carrier to demonstrate the comprehensive strength and cultural charm of a city. The tourism industry of Deyang has witnessed tremendous changes in recent decades.” Speaking of Deyang’s tourism development, Wang Yuhua, former Vice Chairperson of the municipal CPPCC, former Director of the Municipal Bureau of Tourism, has a myriad of thoughts. “Prominent location advantage, rich natural resources and the policy support of the Party Committee and government all sustain Deyang’s flourishing culture and tourism.”
The Emergence of Tourism
In 2002, Wang Yuhua was transferred to be the Director of Deyang Municipal Bureau of Tourism (“Deyang Municipal Bureau of Culture, Broadcasting, Television and Tourism” now). He introduced that Deyang Municipal Bureau of Tourism was established in 1991. Since then, with the strong leadership of the municipal committee and government, it has been building the city into a new tourism destination by grasping the trend of tourism development and serving the central work of the city under the guidance of tourism authorities at central, provincial and municipal levels in different periods.
From 1991 to 2005, Deyang established tourism organizations of city and county levels, formulated overall development plans, fostered the vigorous development of the industry and expanded tourism marketing. In this way, the tourism industry entered into an early stage of high-speed development. In 1995, the municipal government set up a leading group of tourism and issued The Notice on Accelerating Tourism Development in Deyang, which laid the foundation for tourism work during the 11th Five-Year Plan period. “The representative tourism products then included the Oriental Soul Stone Carving Art Wall, Mianzhu New Year Painting Club, Pangtong Temple, Sanxingdui Museum in Guanghan, Western Jingqi Happy Valley and 2-star Zhongjiang Garden Hotel,” said Wang Yuhua.
Create “Famous Tourism Brand” of the City
It is the most impressive event in Wang Yuhua’s tourism career that Deyang became an Excellent Tourism City in China. “In March 1995, the then National Tourism Administration decided to launch the selection of Excellent Tourism City in China. In November 2003, Deyang submitted an application and made an oath: to become China’s Excellent Tourism City by gathering the strength and wisdom of the whole city!” Wang Yuhua still remembers it so far. “Since its official launch in May 2004, the people in the whole city worked hard together to create a famous tourism brand.”
Wang Yuhua can list out Deyang’s tourism resources explicitly: as one of the three major great international tourism destinations in the province, Sanxingdui, which stunned the world after thousands of years’ sleeping, is the first batch of 4A scenic spots in the country and a must-see for Chinese and foreign tourists; there is also Deyang Confucius Temple, one of the three major Confucius Temples in China, Mianzhu New Year Painting, one of China’s four new Chinese paintings, Dexiao as the Great City of Virtue and Filial Piety, Dayue in Cangshan as the Live Music Stone, and Deyang stone carving art wall as China’s largest modern stone engraving group. Wang Yuhua said excitedly, “The rich tourism resources have laid a solid foundation for Deyang to become an Excellent Tourism City in China and provided high-purity ‘gold’ for its famous tourism brand.” At the 2nd Annual Conference of China Tourism Marketing in January 2007, Deyang won the honorary title of China’s Best Tourism Destination, meaning it became one of the 46 best tourist destinations in the country. In the same year, Deyang also became the laureate of China’s Outstanding Tourism City.
The period from 2006 to 2010 witnessed a rapid recovery of tourism. With the destruction of the natural disaster “5.12” Wenchuan earthquake, the total tourism revenue dropped from RMB4.8 billion in 2006 to RMB2.442 billion in 2008. Deyang, grasping major opportunities such as post-disaster reconstruction, domestic demand expansion and the development of the western region, formulated The Opinions on Promoting the Post-Disaster Recovery and Development of Tourism Industry of Deyang. With its guidance, people in this industry made great efforts to make innovations and overcome difficulties to promote the recovery and reconstruction. Therefore, it took only 3 years for tourism to restore to the pre-earthquake level, which laid a good foundation for its accelerated development. In 2010, the total tourism revenue returned to RMB4.077 billion. Wang Yuhua said: “Representative events during this period included: Deyang becoming China’s outstanding tourist city in 2007, the introduction of The Division and Evaluation Standards of Deyang Star-rated Farmhouse, and starting the establishment of a demonstration city with tourism standards. The featured products were Duan’s 2A-level Courtyard and 4-star Jinghu Hotel. 32 travel agencies were also established. In addition, Deyang actively participated in well-known exhibitions such as China Travel Fair and National Tourism Commodities Fair. It also signed inter-city tourism cooperation agreements with Chongqing and Mianyang. During this period, Deyang’s tourism industry entered into a new stage of revitalization with its rapid development.”
From Tourism Industry to Culture and Tourism Industry
From 2011 to 2015, following the principle of “guidance of the government, orientation of market, dominating role of enterprise and self-governance of industry”, taking the accelerated establishment of Sichuan characteristic cultural tourism zone as the starting point, Deyang has integrated the tourism resources, accelerated industrial integration, innovated development model and improved development quality so as to give full play to tourism’s engine and leading role in the service industry, and has achieved a major breakthrough in constructing Deyang into a tourism destination and transforming the development mode of tourism. During the 11th Five-Year Plan period, there were 5 national A-level scenic spots, 9 star-rated hotels, 83 star-rated farmhouses, 43 travel agencies, 1 tourism company and 40 tourist vehicles. In the 12th Five-Year period, there were 9 national A-level tourist attractions, including 3 new national 4A ones, 11 star-rated hotels, including 5 new ones, meaning that 0 star-rated hotel became history, 105 3-star and above farmhouses, 2 theme tourist hotels, 39 travel agencies, 7 provincial-level tourist shopping areas, including two 5A ones and four 4A ones, 5 travel companies as well as 129 tourist vehicles. “It is now a relatively complete tourism industry system with a certain scale,” said Wang Yuhua.
In 2012, Wang Yuhua left his office in tourism. Although being in retirement for many years, he is still very concerned about the development of tourism in Deyang: “On July 25 this year, the cultural and tourism development conference was held. Unlike the 2011 Deyang Tourism Development Conference, it placed culture and tourism in the same position. It has re-stressed the principle of ‘guidance of the government, orientation of market, dominating role of enterprise and self-governance of industry’, and planned to innovate and improve the development policy of culture and tourism, play market’s decisive role in resources allocation, strive to cultivate and expand the market entity of culture and tourism, mobilize social strength to participate and create a good environment for its development. As an old worker in tourism, I am excited.”
Up to now, Deyang boasts 18 cultural landscapes and 21 natural scenic spots. Among them, there are 5 national key cultural relics protection units, 15 national A-level scenic spots, 2 national geological parks, and 1 national forest park. Meanwhile, the “exporting” and “importing” of Deyang’s culture have gained remarkable achievements. Angkor Dynasty, a culture and tourism project of Belt and Road, settled in Angkor Wat, Cambodia. Sanxingdui Cultural Industrial Park and theme parks are in accelerated construction. Wang Yuhua is very excited when talking about the new achievements.
At present, Deyang is in a critical development period of transformation, innovation and progress. It is facing major opportunities of Belt and Road, the Yangtze River Economic Belt, a new-round western development, comprehensive innovation reform, Chengdu-Chongqing urban agglomeration and the integrated development of Chengdu and Deyang. “The Municipal Party Committee and Government mentioned in The Opinions on Developing the Culture and Tourism Economy to Accelerate the Construction of a City of Ancient Shu Culture that we are to the construct a National All-for-One Tourism Demonstration Zone, Sanxingdui World Ancient Civilization Research and Culture and Tourism Highland, Chengdu Metropolitan Cultural Sub-center, and high-value Culture and Tourism Industry. I am looking forward to that. I also believe that when the goal ‘building Deyang into a well-known city of ancient Shu culture and elaborate tourism destination with prosperous culture and deep-integrated culture and tourism industry’ is achieved, the city will receive more domestic and foreign tourists with a new appearance,” said Wang Yuhua. (Reporter: Zeng Zheng)
