“Splendid Hunan” Hot in UK

　　The China-UK relationship is in a “golden age”. The 2018 statistics show that the UK has become Hunan’s largest source of European tourists.

　　Photo source: hnswht.gov.cn

　　On March 28, 2019, a Hunan culture and tourism promotion conference was held at the Landmark Hotel in London. After that, “Splendid Hunan” was hot on UK’s mainstream media and social media and attracted increasing attention.

　　This was the second Hunan promotion event for its cultural and tourist cooperation and exchange in UK. The first session was last year. It was supported by the Chinese Embassy in UK and organized by the Hunan Department of Culture and Tourism and the London office of the Chinese Ministry of Culture and Tourism. Activities included culture and tourism promotion meetings, photography exhibitions, acrobatics and folk music shows, intangible cultural heritage performances, culture and tourism cooperation forums, project matchmaking and signing ceremonies and visits and tours. Britons were invited to tell their stories, share their trips and experience in Hunan to show Hunan in an all-round way as a destination of “Best Value – 10 places made for affordable adventures”.

　　Photo source: hnswht.gov.cn

　　Hunan Governor Xu Dazhe delivered a speech at the promotion conference on further promoting Hunan-UK culture and tourism strategic interaction, cultural and tourism industry cooperation, cultural exchange, and friendly-city relationship.

　　As of April 5, there were 21 UK media reports on the “Splendid Hunan” culture and tourism promotion conference, including those in Travel and Tour World, and Travel Bulletin. Travel Trade Gazette, the world's oldest travel trade newspaper, had special coverage of the event. The LEVA-EU celebrated tourists, gastronomes, and traveling websites marked the event on their social media accounts.

　　Orlando Edwards, regional manager for the Americas and East Asia at the British Council, Timothy Jenkins, Policy and Public Affairs Manager at VisitBritain, and Pat Conner, director of BBC South West, also twittered to share their Hunan stories. Wendy Wu, the largest China tour organization and other travel agencies presented sent emails to congratulate the success of the conference. The details are as follows:

　　Source: travelandtourworld.com

　　Travel and Tour World, a UK travel magazine, published a report “Chinese province Hunan targets UK market”.

　　Source: travelbulletin.co.uk

　　Travel Bulletin, a UK travel magazine, describes Hunan’s culture and tourism promotion personnel, in the report “‘Has To Be China’ as globetrotters in the year of the pig”.

　　Source: news.changsha.cn

　　Orlando Edwards, regional manager for the Americas and East Asia at the British Council, promotes cooperation between Hunan Museum and British Museum on his Twitter.

　　Source: news.changsha.cn

　　Timothy Jenkins, special representative of the British National Tourist Office promotes cooperation between Hunan and Britain on his Twitter.

　　Some comments from the guests attending the conference:

　　“Thank you so much for inviting me to your Hunan promotion conference yesterday which was really impressive. The performances were excellent and the speeches were very informative. I particularly liked the films. I’m very pleased for you that the conference was so well-attended.”

　　-- Pat Conner, director of BBC South West

　　“Thank you for inviting me to the excellent presentation on Hunan last week. I will be promoting China and certainly now Hunan. I was in Fenghuang back in 2010 but didn’t get the chance to explore fully the province and now realise I need to return!”

　　-- Steve Wilson, general manager of Linger International Travel Agency

　　“First of all, many congratulations on yesterday’s splendid event – easily one of the best that I have ever been involved in.”

　　-- Philip Cooke, Marketing, PR and International Representation of

　　The Destination Marketing Group

　　This article is from Hunan Provincial Government.