According to the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, travel for tourism in China during the three- day Dragon Boat Festival last week increased 32.3% from a year earlier to an estimated 106 million, 12.8% above the pre-pandemic level in 2019.

As a gauge of consumer demand in the world's second-largest economy, China's tourism figures are highly followed. Beijing is anticipated to promise additional measures to spur development amid indications that the recovery following the easing of Covid-19 restrictions is stalling.

Contrary to the tourism data made public late on Saturday, the Transport Ministry's estimates on Saturday showed that overall travel for the holiday weekend from Thursday through Saturday increased 89.1% from the previous year but decreased 22.8% from 2019.

The tourism ministry reported that revenue from domestic travel during the Dragon Boat Festival increased 44.5% year over year to 37.31 billion yuan (RM24.2 billion), rebounding to 94.9% of the 2019 level.

According to the Tourism Ministry, the comparison between the 2023 and 2019 estimates was done "according to comparable standards."

According to data released by the Tourist Ministry last month, the Dragon Boat Festival's tourist rebound is less significant than that of the five-day May Day holiday, when domestic tourism visits increased by 19.1% over 2018 and by 70.8% over the previous year.

According to Ctrip, China's largest online travel service, orders for tickets at domestic tourist websites during the past week's holiday more than doubled from the level in 2019.