China's Zhangjiajie Municipal Actively Working On Services To Woo Muslim Tourists

By Samantha Tan CHANGSHA, (Hunan, China), Oct 30 (Bernama) -- China's Zhangjiajie Municipal People's Government is actively introducing halal catering and accommodation services in order to tap the growing Muslim tourist market. Deputy Mayor of Zhangjiajie City, Cheng Danfeng, said the municipal was aware of the limited catering and accommodation services to cater to Muslim tourists and was looking at the best ways to provide halal products. "We are actively finding ways to provide halal services to Muslim tourists, especially from Malaysia, Indonesia and the Middle East," he told reporters from ASEAN countries along the Maritime Silk Road during a media familiarisation trip, here, Friday. Organised by the Information Office of the People's Government of Hunan Province from Oct 25 to 30, the trip aims to promote the province to ASEAN countries as part of China's 'One Belt, One Road' initiative to revive the ancient Silk Road. On the means of transportation to the province, Cheng said there was no discussion on direct flights from Malaysia to Zhangjiajie, which could be due to the lack of communication and negotiations between travel agencies of the two nations. "We believe that one of the reasons is because Muslims in Malaysia think it is hard to get (halal) food and accommodation here. "In this regard, we are now actively introducing Muslim food and provide assistance to restaurants in Lanzhou, Yinchuan and Xinjiang (where many Muslims reside) to open (halal restaurants) in Zhangjiajie," he said. Cheng said the Zhangjiajie Municipal Ethnic Affairs Commission had also proposed to build an Islamic centre which would include restaurants, hotels and space for religious purposes. He explained that the municipal had incorporated policies to encourage and support Muslim restaurants to operate in Zhangjiajie, such as providing subsidies as well as land use for operators to build restaurants. He said the policies had attracted a restaurant from Gansu, which was keen to open an outlet in Zhangjiajie. Cheng said currently, Zhangjiajie's top three tourist generating markets were South Korea, Taiwan and Thailand, which topped in tourist arrivals from Southeast Asia. He said Zhangjiajie received between 22,000 and 30,000 tourists from Thailand each year via direct flights from Bangkok to Zhangjiajie. "There have also been proposals to have direct flights between Singapore and Zhangjiajie," he added. In recent years, Zhangjiajie which is located in the northwest of Hunan Province, has received tremendous attention from foreign tourists following the impact of the movies, 'Avatar' and 'Zhuo Yao Ji' (Monster Hunt), as well as the Wingsuit Championship. The 2009 movie, 'Avatar', was filmed in the Zhangjiajie National Forest Park. Due to its particular landform, Zhangjiajie has also been listed as among China's first national parks, the first batch of world natural heritage and the first batch of world geo-park. --BERNAMA