Visitors enjoy the blooming flowers at Bozhou, Anhui province, May 1, 2024. (PHOTO: XINHUA)

Edited by QI Liming

China's economy is showing a good recovery momentum in 2024, with the recent Labor Day holiday travel boom indicating economic vitality, according to official data. Business insiders and experts have positive expectations for China's economic rebound, praising the Chinese economy's contribution to global economic recovery.

Tourism economy in full swing

China's tourism market continued its hot trend during the Labor Day holiday, with the cross-regional flow of travelers recorded at about 1.36 billion. It meant an average of more than 270 million visitors per day, an increase of 24.1 percent over the same period in 2019. New business forms integrating culture and tourism are leading the new trend of consumption.

According to Business Wire, outbound travel transactions via Alipay saw a 77 percent increase year on year during the Labor Day holiday, with total spending up by 10 percent. Inbound tourism by international travelers in the Chinese mainland witnessed a 700 percent spike year on year in Alipay spendings.

Lynn Song, chief economist for Greater China at ING, said China will sustain strong growth in domestic and inbound tourism in 2024. "As more investment is made into the tourism industry, this could be a multi-year driver of growth," he said. "China has rich cultural and ecological tourism hotspots, providing a great foundation to build upon."

A Goldman Sachs note said, "The strong Labor Day holiday tourism data, together with the still-solid April services [purchasing managers' index], bode well for consumption and services recovery in coming months."

Q1 GDP up 5.3%

In the first quarter of 2024, China's GDP grew 5.3 percent year on year, data from the National Bureau of Statistics on April 16 showed.

The international community is paying close attention to the long-term positive trend of China's economic recovery, and a number of international financial institutions raised their forecasts for China's economic growth.

Societe Generale raised its 2024 growth forecast to five percent from 4.7 percent, while Deutsche Bank now expects 5.2 percent growth, half a percentage point above its previous prediction.

A report by the UN Conference on Trade and Development predicted that China's economy will achieve a growth target of around five percent this year, while a Bloomberg report said in the next five years, China will account for the largest share of new economic activity in the world.

"The economy appears within reach to meet the official target of 'around 5 percent' GDP growth in 2024," Frederic Neumann, chief Asia economist for HSBC, told CNN.

Harry Murphy Cruise, economist at Moody's Analytics, said, "The strong first-quarter growth figure goes a long way in achieving China's 'around five percent' target for the year."