Research on the Impact of Tourism on Rural China and Farmers

Author: Li Zhou
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2004-09-01
Features:
Over the past two decades, the tourism industry, particularly domestic tourism, has developed rapidly, exerting an increasing impact on rural areas and farmers. It has become a new emerging industry in many rural regions, yet related research is still lacking. This fundamental issue—how much income and employment opportunities the tourism industry generates for rural areas and farmers—cannot be answered through current tourism statistics and studies. This paper attempts to explore this question. Building on a review of the current state of rural tourism development, the paper employs three methods to examine the distribution of tourism income between urban and rural areas and among urban and rural residents. Taking this as a starting point, it analyzes the impact of tourism on rural development and farmers' income and employment from both macro and micro perspectives, and explores how tourism can promote rural development through shared policies. This book is primarily empirical, divided into seven chapters:
Chapter 1 is the introduction, focusing on the significance of the topic and the problems to be addressed.
Chapter 2 reviews the development of tourism in rural areas from four aspects: poverty alleviation through tourism, sightseeing agriculture, rural tourism, and tourist towns. By evaluating the current research level, it identifies unresolved issues and outlines the approach of this paper to address them.
Chapter 3 covers the methodology and data processing for tourism impact research. It employs expert surveys, added-value rate methods, and input-output methods to study the distribution of tourism income and tourism added value between urban and rural areas, as well as among urban and rural residents, and analyzes tourism income multipliers and employment multipliers.
Chapter 4 compares the differences and basic characteristics of tourism development in eastern, central, and western regions based on processed statistical data. It also compares the contributions of tourism to farmers' income growth and employment in these regions and further analyzes the development of tourism in the western region.
Chapter 5 presents a primary case study, primarily to verify the reliability of some basic conclusions drawn in Chapters 3 and 4, and to further explore the characteristics of rural and farmers' benefits, as well as suitable development models for tourism in rural areas.
Chapter 6 discusses the rapid growth in tourism supply capacity from the perspective of property rights restructuring.
Chapter 7 evaluates the development of rural tourism.