The city’s Tourism conference was held recently at the Municipal Building. Development plans for the city’s tourism sector were made at the conference.

Last year, the city’s tourism sector had overcome the unfavorable influence of the SARS epidemic and accelerated the building up of a sustainable development system for tourism. The city had welcomed16.9 million tourists from home and abroad and realized a total income of 13.7 billion Yuan. Investments totaled 3.4 billion Yuan were introduced to the sector and 80% of the investors were foreign and non state run enterprises. New scenic spots like the Peek of Laoshan Mountain, and the Underwater World have been built up and opened to the public. A competition in the sector was launched for providing better services to the visitors.

This year, the tourism sector highlight will be on the awareness of being internationalized and promote the development of the city’s tourism. Qingdao is expected to see 19.98 million visitors this year with a total tourism income of 18 billion Yuan. (top86)