China Tourism Leads Launch of Central SOE Cruise Operator With Asia’s Biggest Fleet

(Yicai) Nov. 24 -- Chinese travel giant China Tourism Group has teamed up with several other companies to set up a central state-owned cruise operator that consolidates their assets to run Asia’s largest cruise fleet so as to inject fresh momentum into the high-quality development of China’s cruise industry.The new platform, which will be managed by China Tourism’s unit Huaxia International Cruises, will be responsible for a fleet of large, luxurious super cruise vessels that includes the Adora Magic City, the Adora Mediterranea, the Nanhai Dream, the Piano Land and the Adora Flora City, Yicai learned from Haikou-based China Tourism.The final part of this consolidation was accomplished on Nov. 21 when China Tourism and China COSCO Shipping Group set up a subsidiary under Huaxia called Star Cruises.Last December, Huaxia said that it would hike its investment in Adora Cruises and work with the Hong Kong-based company’s parent firm CSSC Cruise Technology Development, which is under the central SEO China State Shipbuilding Corp., to build a complete industrial chain covering everything from cruise ship design and construction to supply chain and operations.Cruise ships create economic value far beyond manufacturing and operations, analysts said. They also drive growth in dozens of industries such as advanced manufacturing, transportation, tourism and trade, financial services as well as cultural industries, producing a strong multiplier effect.Every CNY1 (USD0.14) of revenue generated by the cruise industry can spur CNY10 to CNY14 in economic activity in upstream and downstream sectors, said Li Ming, general manager of Shanghai-based Huaxia.China’s cruise industry experienced a golden decade from 2008 to 2017, and the country became the world’s second-largest source of cruise passengers, after the United States, said Wang Hong, director of the Shanghai International Cruise Economy Research Center. During that period, the number of cruise travellers expanded at an annual rate of 40 percent to 50 percent. The nation’s cruise economy is now embarking on a new growth cycle, he added.China’s cruise ports handled 344 cruise ships in the first three quarters, a jump of 17 percent from a year ago. Some 2.05 million passengers arrived or departed the country on these vessels, a year-on-year increase of 28 percent.China Tourism holds a 35.3 percent stake in Huaxia, which was founded in December 2023, while China COSCO Shipping Group and China Merchants Group each own 17.6 percent.Editor: Kim Taylor