Hainan tourism gained rapid and quality growth in the first nine months of the year, thanks to improvement of services, infrastructure and development of “all-for-one tourism”, which brought in 64.2 billion yuan ($9.25 billion) in business revenue, according to information shared at a press conference on Oct 23 in Haikou, capital of South China’s Hainan province.

The number of tourists visiting the tropical island continued to increase rapidly in the first three quarters, with the central and western regions seeing faster growth than the traditional eastern areas, said Wang Yuan, deputy director with the Hainan provincial statistics bureau.

Wang said the province received 52.3 million tourists, an increase of 12.8 percent, including 43.9 million overnight tourists, an increase of 11.6 percent. About 871,700 visitors came from overseas, up 9.4 percent, and they created an income of $527 million for local tourism businesses. Total business revenue saw an increase of 15.8 percent, to hit 64.2 billion yuan.

Though the eastern regions are still the main tourist destinations, the central and western regions - Lingao, Ledong, Baoting and Danzhou, for instance, gained a faster expansion of 12.9 and 18.4 percent, respectively, thanks to efforts in exploring special feature farming, cultural or folklore attractions.

Hainan’s gross domestic product reached 354.6 billion yuan in the first nine months of the year, up 5.4 percent year-on-year, an expansion within expectation, with rapid growth reported in key sectors such as its tropical–feature agriculture and the service sectors, and tourism as well, according to information released at the press conference.

Investment in fixed assets and housing turnover continued to fall as a result of market control measures in Hainan, where the real estate industry used to be pillar of the local economy.

Investment in real estate development dropped by 15.2 percent from January to September, while sales of housing amounted to 11.38 million square meters, down by 34.6 percent, and sales revenue reached 167.7 billion yuan, down by 17 percent.

Investment in accommodation and catering, and finance, on the other hand, saw impressive increases of 36.5 percent and 29 percent, respectively.