Analysis of Chongqing's Tourism and Economic Growth under the Impact of the Pandemic

Abstract

Tourism is the backbone of any country's economic development. Domestic and offshore tourism was the most affected by the COVID-19 crisis, and more than any other sector globally in China. China's once flourishing tourism industry has endured a significant impact due to travel restrictions, regional isolation, and quarantine measures. This study focusses on historical tourist economic data from the micro to the macro level in order to assess the impact of tourism on Chongqing's and China's economy both before and after the pandemic crisis. The study used the vector error correction model (VECM) to quantitatively analyze data on Chongqing Gross Domestic Product (GDP), China tourism revenue (CTR) and Chongqing tourism revenue (CQTR) for the period from 2004 to 2023. The results show that COVID-19 leads to a significant decline in tourism-related income. In terms of the relationship between the two, after quantitative analysis of variance the effect of CQTR on Chongqing GDP is unidirectional rather than the main cause of Chongqing GDP, and the relationship between CQTR and CTR is bidirectional and interacts with it. This also explains why the CQTR dramatically drops in 2021–2023 while Chongqing GDP grows continuously and shows the reason why CQTR and CTR go up or down in the same trend.