{"id":8264,"date":"2022-06-02T07:30:18","date_gmt":"2022-06-02T07:30:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/focus.cbbc.org\/?p=8264"},"modified":"2025-04-23T09:39:48","modified_gmt":"2025-04-23T09:39:48","slug":"how-camping-became-next-big-china-travel-trend","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/focus.cbbc.org\/how-camping-became-next-big-china-travel-trend\/","title":{"rendered":"How camping became the next big China travel trend"},"content":{"rendered":"
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After decades of mass migration to cities, today, many young people in China are turning to nature for adventure, solace, and to escape their urban working lives<\/h2>\n

With tight border restrictions and barren flight schedules suspending international leisure travel from China and months-long lockdowns in major cities making even inter-provincial travel near impossible, China\u2019s travel sector has had a very difficult couple of years. However, one niche area has seen surprising growth since 2020: camping.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The market for campsites in China increased from RMB 7.71 billion in 2014 to RMB 29.9 billion in 2021 according to data from iiMedia Research Institute quoted in the Global Times<\/em>. New campsites are springing up on the outskirts of cities, offering the feeling of a holiday without having to worry about crossing into a different province and getting caught up in zero Covid restrictions<\/a>.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

As a recent episode of Tong Digital\u2019s podcast Tracing the Trend explored, beyond the pandemic, there are several factors driving the rediscovery of the Chinese countryside, including a desire to reevaluate the nation\u2019s recent relationship with rural areas, and the increasing pressure of urban lifestyles.<\/p>\n

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The Chinese countryside: past and present<\/h4>\n

The historical roots of Chinese attitudes to the countryside can be traced back hundreds \u2013 if not thousands \u2013 of years, but a notable recent influence was the \u201cup to the mountains, down to the countryside\u201d movement headed by Chairman Mao Zedong in the late 1960s. During this time, 17 million urban youth from across China were sent to remote areas with the expectation that they would learn valuable skills from farming communities. The gruelling lifestyle was heavily romanticised by the Communist Party, as farming communities provided a significant support base for the Communist revolution.<\/p>\n

Despite this positive narrative about the countryside, for many, China\u2019s urban spaces have always been associated with privilege. Alongside economic opportunities, this has been one of the factors driving the mass migration from rural to urban areas in recent decades, and has led to \u201cdamaging perceptions of the countryside as \u2018backwards\u2019, [which] has created a bit of a rift and also socio-economic inequalities between cities and rural areas in more recent decades,\u201d according to Tracing the Trend\u2019s host Stefan Harvey.<\/p>\n

Having spent her childhood in Yunnan province, the founder of off-the-beaten-path travel agency Wild China, Mei Zhang, holds two images of the Chinese countryside in her mind. On the one hand is the notion of a timeless countryside, where farmers work in the paddy fields of an idyllic landscape, just as they have done for millennia. However, it cannot be overlooked that these farmers also struggle through hard labour. That struggle is ultimately what leads to younger generations being taught that \u201cthis is what you want to get away from, move to the city.\u201d<\/p>\n

On the other hand, Zhang recalls recently seeing a farmer using their smartphone to live stream produce to affluent consumers<\/a> in major cities. Here we can see an overlap between the idea of a timeless agrarian life and cutting-edge technology and consumerism. This concept has been heavily reflected in recent ventures by tech giant Alibaba, which is investing in connecting farmers with city-dwellers via live streaming<\/a> to maximise sales of produce.<\/p>\n