News from the World Tourism Resource Exposition 2007 is that outbound travel has become the fastest growing and most active part of China's travel market and the country's outbound tourists have increased by 2.8 times in the past five years.

12.13 million Chinese went to travel in foreign countries in 2001, while the number reached 34 million by 2006, an increase of 2.8-fold. In doing so, China has surpassed Japan and become the largest tourist exporting country in Asia.

In 2006, China added 15 new travel destinations for its citizens and the total overseas travel destinations for Chinese reached 132. It is estimated that China's outbound tourists will reach 37.4 million this year, an increase of 10% over that of last year and the figure will reach more than 50 million by 2015.

Travel agencies say that with the price drop of outbound travel in the surrounding countries, more middle-income travelers have begun to join the outbound tour groups and those whose monthly family income ranges from RMB5000 to RMB30000 have become the main force of the short haul outbound travel. In addition, China's outbound travelers spend more on shopping and entertainment than on food, accommodation and air tickets.