hankyoreh

An eye-catching Chinese language advertisement for a restaurant in the Myeongdong area of Seoul in May 2015. (Hankyoreh Archive)

Chinese tourist groups may be returning to South Korea as early as next month amid news of the lifting of a March 2017 ban on group travel imposed by Chinese authorities in response to the THAAD system deployment. Authorities in some Chinese provincial governments and cities reportedly issued guidelines at meetings with local travel agencies on Nov. 27 and 28 to allow travel to South Korea through group visas.

In contrast with individual visas – for which individual Chinese tourists pay a processing fee and apply for review and issuance by South Korean government offices in China – group visas are issued when a travel agency recruits three or more tourists as part of a group, which is reported to the South Korean Ministry of Justice and China National Tourism Administration (CNTA). Individual visas are issued for short-terms of 90 days and less and carry a standard issuance fee of 280 yuan (US$42), while group visas are subjected to a processing fee waiver system that the South Korean government has extended to next year from its originally scheduled end date in late 2017 in a bid to attract tourists.

Travel agencies in China have been subject to a halt to all sales of group tourism packages to South Korea since Mar. 15, immediately after full-scale THAAD equipment delivery and deployment began. At the time, Chinese authorities summoned local travel agencies to report a ban on South Korea travel – although the orders were only given unofficially without leaving a paper trail, and the government did not officially acknowledge involvement. Meeting with a Hankyoreh reporter two months after the measures were imposed, CNTA vice chairman Du Gang stressed the need for government intervention when asked whether issues related to South Korea travel were solvable.

“You’ll need to check with the two governments,” Du said at the time.

For now, the travel industry is welcoming the change, reactivating a network of linked businesses within South Korea that had been all but shut down. “Many of the travel agencies in Seoul [that contract with Chinese travel agencies to provide services to tourists] have been on long-term breaks or holidays, but some of the places I contacted today [Nov. 28] said employees would be able to report to work as of Dec. 1,” said a source at one Beijing travel agency.

“If you take into account the ‘recovery period’ and the time it takes to create new tourism products and recruit customers, it looks like we’ll be able to send tour groups by around Dec. 20,” the source added.

The ban’s lifting is subject to some restrictions. To begin with, it only applies to group travel from Beijing and Shandong Province, while departures from other locations are reportedly still disallowed, along with any itinerary related to the Lotte Group (such as Lotte duty-free stores or hotels), charter flights, and cruises. Industry observers predict tour group departures from other locations will be phased back in.

“Based on past years, packages with departures from Beijing and Shandong Province account for a fairly small percentage at around 30%,” a source said. “There’s a lot of interest in the future for the Huadong region (Shanghai and Zhejiang and Jiangsu Provinces), which accounts for close to 50%.”

For a South Korean tourism industry hit hard by the THAAD conflict, the resumption of group tours may be seen as a symbolic measure for the Oct. 31 agreement that smoothed over the frictions. It’s also seen as a clear signal of improved ties from Beijing ahead of South Korean President Moon Jae-in’s scheduled China visit and South Korea-China summit next month. Many are now watching for visible measures on the airing of South Korean (Korean Wave) content and appearances by South Korean entertainers.

But some observers maintain that with fewer Chinese tour group visits and more individual visitors bringing “constitutional improvements” to the South Korean tourism industry, the THAAD issue has left some difficult issues to address. Others predict that even with orders from Chinese authorities, some time will be needed for group tours to resume from their total halt.

By Kim Oi-hyun, Beijing correspondent

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