CHINA: Wang Jianlin Chairman Dalian Wanda Group Promises To Invest $14.7 Billion In Tourism

Chinese conglomerate Dalian Wanda Group Co Ltd said on Friday it will increase its investment in the southern province of Hunan by 100 billion yuan ($14.69 billion) to build a mega cultural and tourism project and 15 shopping malls.

Wanda, owned by China's richest man, Wang Jianlin, said most of the investment will go to Changsha, Hunan's capital city. It will add five more "Wanda Plaza" shopping malls in the city, and spend 50 billion yuan to build a "Wanda City" - a development that usually includes theme parks, shopping malls, hotels and residential projects.

"The entry of Wanda Plazas will significantly raise the business standard in Hunan cities, stimulate consumption, increase stable tax income and create a lot of jobs in the service industry," Wanda said in a statement. They will "enhance the transformation and upgrade of Hunan's economic structure."

Wanda is building similar projects around the country, betting that China's rising incomes will drive more domestic tourism. Wang said that Wanda would look to build at least 20 such complexes in China.

The group last saw the opening of a tourism park in the eastern city of Hefei in September.

Wang has been open about his rivalry with Walt Disney Co which opened a $5.5 billion resort in Shanghai in June.

Wanda Cultural Tourism Planning & Research Institute and Xishuangbanna Water Park were recently awarded a Leading Edge Award from the World Waterpark Association (WWA).

WWA, headquartered in United States, is the only authoritative organization in the international waterpark industry.

On October 19, Wanda Hotels & Resorts held its 2016 exhibition in Wanda Sofitel Beijing. 100 hotels owned by Wanda comprehensively showed the elegant demeanor of the four owned luxury hotel brands – Wanda Reign, Wand Vista, Wanda Realm and Wanda Jin to the industry.

On November 11, Wanda Group signed a strategic cooperation agreement with Changsha Municipal Government of Hunan Province. Under the agreement, Wanda Group will invest another RMB100 billion in Hunan with the construction of Wanda Cities and Wanda Plazas across the province.

The Group will invest RMB60 billion in Changsha with RMB50 billion allocated to the construction of a Wanda City. In addition, Wanda will also look into organizing international sporting events in Hunan. Together with the group’s earlier investments, Wanda is set to invest a total of over RMB120 billion in Hunan. The agreement signing ceremony was attended by Xu Dazhe, acting governor of Hunan Province, and Wang Jianlin, Chairman of Wanda Group.

Changsha Wanda City will be the second Wanda City to be built in central China following Nanchang Wanda City. It will be designed and constructed in accordance with the highest international standards and, once completed, it will drastically strengthen the tourism sector in Changsha, making it a world-class vacation destination and adding a new super IP to Changsha, which is called China’s Entertainment Capital.

Wanda Group plans to invest RMB50 billion to build 15 Wanda Plazas in cities across the province including Changsha, Yueyang, Hengyang, Changde, Zhuzhou, Chenzhou and Yongzhou; 5 of which in Changsha. This also marks the group’s first investments in Yueyang, Zhuzhou, Chenzhou and Yongzhou. With the new Wanda Plazas, the Group will have complete coverage of Hunan. The Wanda Plazas will significantly improve Hunan’s commercialac sector and promote consumers’ spending in the area. This, in turn, will ensure stable tax sources, create jobs in the service sector and promote the economic transformation of Hunan.

Terrifying Skywalk Opens In China

THE photographs alone are enough to make you break out in a cold sweat.

China has just opened what could be the world’s most terrifying skywalk so far — a 100m-long, 1.6m glass path strapped to the side of the Tianmen Mountain in Hunan province.

Called the Coiling Dragon Cliff skywalk, it overlooks Tongtian Avenue, a mountain road with 99 turns that snakes up the mountain in Hunan’s Zhangjiajie National Forest Park.

It also provides a gut-churning view of the 300m drop below.

Photographs from the skywalk, which has just opened to the public, show some cautious visitors staying close to the mountainside while others bravely posed for photographs closer to the edge.

We’re hoping visitors to the Coiling Dragon Cliff will have better luck than the tourists who walked along a skywalk China’s Henan province that began to shatter last year.

Tourists were left screaming when the Yuntai Mountain walkway — an incredible 1000m above the ground — appeared to start to give way.

Witnesses said the 68cm-wide glass pane shattered when they walked over it, and panic caused a mini stampede towards the end of the path.

Lee Dong Hai, who was on the walkway at the time, shared his moment of terror on the social media site Weibo.

“My foot shook a little. I looked down and I saw that there was a crack in the floor,” he wrote.

“A lot of people started to scream. I screamed out, ‘It cracked! It really cracked!’ and then I pushed the people in front of me so that we could run out of the way.”

CHINA: More Chinese Tourists Blacklisted For Mis Behaving And Causing Shame To China

Five more badly behaved tourists have been put on national blacklist by the authorities in China.

They include three people who got into a row over a seat that was tipped back on an airliner and man who attacked a convenience store worker in Japan.

Sixteen Chinese tourist have been put on the blacklist so far this year, the China Tourism Administration said on its website.

The three latest cases took place between August and October, it added.

A man from Shanghai, Rong Jiaxin, beat up a convenience store clerk who stopped his wife tearing apart food wrappers before paying for items at a store in Sapporo in September, the statement said.

Rong thought staff were humiliating his wife and punched a clerk on the nose.

Police later detained the couple.

Three people from Sichuan province in southwest China were put on the blacklist after they were involved in a scuffle on an airliner flying from Siem Reap to Chengdu in October.

A woman reclined her seat after boarding the plane and got involved in a row with another couple.

They were later forced to leave the plane and the flight was delayed for more than an hour.

The third incident involved a man, Huang Jiankui, from Hunan Province, the tourism authority said.

He quarrelled with a tour guide and hit them on the head with a teacup after refusing to buy a ticket for his child during a one-day tour of a mountainous resort in Sichuan province in August.

His child was taller than 1.2 metres and children under that height did not have to buy a ticket.

Twelve of the 16 Chinese tourists blacklisted so far this year were involved in incidents related to air travel, the tourism authority said.

These varied from opening emergency doors on aircraft to throwing hot water over flight attendants.

Tourists remain on the blacklist for one to three years and it is circulated to organisations including travel companies and airlines.

The media in China regularly reports on incidents of Chinese tourists behaving badly at home and abroad.

State media have said the behaviour of some Chinese tourists was damaging the country’s reputation overseas.