Nepal hopes to get a large number of Chinese tourists starting next year after the two countries sign an agreement to that effect, most likely later this month, the Nepal Tourism Board says. The NTB led a group of Nepali tourism operators to the China International Travel Mart at Kunming earlier this month to do some preliminary marketing. The number of China's outbound tourists in 2000 exceeded 10 million, of which about 5.6 million travelled abroad for leisure and holiday. China's State Council last year approved 17 outbound destinations for Chinese travellers: Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines, Australia, New Zealand, Republic of Korea, Japan, Indonesia, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Brunei, Myanmar, Nepal, Hong Kong and Macau. Three more countries, Germany, Egypt and Malta, were added to the list in June 2001.
Nepal has direct air connections with China, but the service is far short of meeting the demand for seats should the Chinese actually decide to visit. The situation is compounded by severe aircraft shortage faced by the Royal Nepal Airlines. Chinese tourists can, however, come via Hong Kong-there are two Dragon Air flights each week-or direct from Lhasa, on the thrice-weekly China Southwest flights.