The Development Strategy of Ice and Snow Tourism in Heilongjiang
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ISSN 1712-8358[Print] Cross-Cultural Communication ISSN 1923-6700[Online] Vol. 11, No. 8, 2015, pp. 53-59 www.cscanada.net DOI:10.3968/7472 www.cscanada.org The Development Strategy of Ice and Snow Tourism in Heilongjiang SUN Xiaochun[a],* [a]School of Economics and Management, Northeast Petroleum University, Daqing, China. INTRODUCTION *Corresponding author. The ice and snow tourism is the tourist product with the most striking feature of the Northern China. Heilongjiang Supported by 2015 Heilongjiang Social Science Project “the Interactive Development Between Cultural Industry and Cultural Consumption of Province, in the northernmost tip of our country, is at Heilongjiang Province”; 2014 Northeast Petroleum University Social pretty high latitude. It has a cold climate and is a major Science Project “the Interactive Development Between Cultural Industry province which has rich ice and snow tourism resources. and Cultural Consumption of Northeast China”. It is also one of the earliest provinces which have carried out the ice and snow tourism. The natural and Received 9 May 2015; accepted 11 July 2015 Published online 26 August 2015 advantageous geographical environment has laid a solid substantial foundation and the vast prospect of exploitation for the ice and snow tourism in Heilongjiang Abstract Province. The development of ice and snow tourism in Heilongjiang Province has abundant resources for ice and Heilongjiang Province began in the middle of the 1990s. snow tourism which has a time-honored history and its After decades of development, Heilongjiang’s ice and development scale is relatively large. But the ice and snow tourism have obtained proud achievement. The snow tourism in other regions at home and abroad is also tourist market of Heilongjiang Province has already developing rapidly, Ice and Snow Tourism in covered 65 countries in the world and all provinces in Heilongjiang faces significant challenges. Therefore, how China, and it has got the ability and conditions to step to develop ice and snow tourism in Heilongjiang better towards the global high-end goal. However, there exist and faster has become a hot topic for the government, certain restricted factors in the development of ice and people in the tourism industry, specialists and scholars in snow tourism in Heilongjiang Province, thus studying the Heilongjiang Province. First, they analyzed the current development of ice and snow tourism in Heilongjiang situation of ice and snow tourism in Heilongjiang deeply, Province has important theoretical and practical based on which they looked for the developing potential significance. of ice and snow tourism in Heilongjiang, and then they used the SWOT analytical method to propose corresponding developing strategies and solutions by 1. THE STATUS QUO OF analyzing the advantages, disadvantages, opportunities DEVELOPMENT OF ICE AND SNOW and challenges of ice and snow tourism in Heilongjiang TOURISM IN HEILONGJIANG PROVINCE Province. Heilongjiang Province has the densest distribution of ice Key words: Heilongjiang Province; Ice and snow and snow tourism resources in our country. It is the tourism; SWOT analysis birthplace of the ice and snow culture, and the art of ice engraving. The history, scale and market influence of its Sun, X. (2015). The Development Strategy of Ice and Snow Tourism in ice sculptures and snow sculptures rank front in the Heilongjiang. Cross-Cultural Communication, 11(8), 53-59. Available country. Currently, Heilongjiang has established the brand from: http://www.cscanada.net/index.php/ccc/article/view/7472 DOI: images of “International Ski Resort” and “Famous Global http://dx.doi.org/10.3968/7472 Ice and Snow Tourism City” and has become one of the 53 Copyright © Canadian Academy of Oriental and Occidental Culture The Development Strategy of Ice and Snow Tourism in Heilongjiang “hottest” areas in our country in terms of ice and snow Daur and other activities are winter sports with unique tourism. The number of tourists grows constantly, and the ethnic characteristics, which possess the potential to be income of tourism increases constantly. Meanwhile, with developed into ice and snow tourism resources (Zhu & the boosting function of ice and snow tourism, more than Tang, 2010). a dozen industries such as transportation, catering and As early as the 1960s, a skiing training base was accommodation in Heilongjiang Province have also established in Yuquan of Heilongjiang Province and the achieved rapid development. The position and role of ice Ice Lantern Garden Party was created in 1963. Then, the and snow tourism in the tourism development strategy Ice and Snow Festival in Harbin was held in 1985. The and economic development strategy of Heilongjiang International Ice and Snow Festival held in Harbin is the Province are more and more important and irreplaceable, first regional festival which takes ice and snow activities and the development potential and value of winter ice and as its contents in Chinese history. During the festival, a snow tourism are inestimable. series of ice and snow activities with local features such as Ice Exhibition, Snow Exhibition, Winter Clothing 1.1 The Current Situation of Natural Resources Exposition, Snowfield Football Match and Winter Heilongjiang Province is located in the northeast of Swimming, provide resources for ice and snow tourism. China, which is the northernmost province with the The Big Ice and Snow World, starting to be built in 1998, highest latitude in China. Heilongjiang Province has becomes a rare large-scale ice and snow tourism exceptional advantages of geographical location and ice extravaganza in the world, which has combined the art of and snow tourism resources to develop ice and snow ice engraving and snow sculpture with ice and snow sports tourism, which lives up to its reputation of Snowy sports. In addition, The Northeast China Culture Festival Forest. and The Mudanjiang Snowcastle Festival in Qiqihar also The geographical environment of Heilongjiang win a high admiration around the world, and their Province is unique, with varied terrain, including influence is also world-famous (Song & Liu, 2008). The mountains, valleys and plains. The topographical features nationally renowned Yabuli Ski Field continually holds are high in south-north lying with a low east-west lying. the International Skiing Festival and Yichun, Jiamusi and The snowfall in winter of Heilongjiang Province is huge, other cities also hold their own ice and snow festivals or yet the temperatures in most areas are mild, with great skiing festivals, which makes Heilongjiang one of the hot ecological environment, suitable slope, stable snow cover spots of national ice and snow tourism. and good snow quality. The snow season is as long as 6 months and snow-cover period lasts more than 100 days, 1.3 The Status Quo of Infrastructure Resources all of which make here a sound natural environment for With many years’ development and construction, the development of ice and snow tourism. For example, Heilongjiang Province has preliminarily built up an ice the number of snow cover days each year in those cities and snow tourism service system which mainly offers like Harbin, Qiqihar, Mudanjiang, Jiamusi and Suihua skiing tourism and takes skating tourism as a area in Heilongjiang Province usually maintain at a complementary. A lot of ski fields, skating rinks and duration of 120 to 140, while the number of snow cover matching tourism reception facilities are successively set days in Yichun and Daxinganling region can be as high as up and gradually improved. The pattern of field facilities 160-200 with the snowfall thickness in those mountain has formed, which takes Yabuli International Standard areas up to 100 to 130 cm (Huang, 2010). The major Competitive Skiing Resort and Skating Center in mountain lands in the whole Heilongjiang Province are Heilongjiang Province as the main body, supplying with Greater Khingan Mountains, Lesser Khingan Mountains, hundreds of tourism skiing resorts, outdoor artificial or Wanda Mountain, Daqing Mountain etc. The number of natural skating rinks. It does provide all kinds of ice and mountains with the height of more than 1,000 meters that snow amateurs with great service sites. At present, the are suitable for constructing skiing fields is more than 100 high, intermediate and primary ski resorts represented by in the whole province, and more than 90% of which are Yabuli, Long-zhu Erlongshan, the Longevity Hill of for recreation. Jihua, Wujimi of Huatian, Riyuexia, the Far West of Longzhu, Mao’er Mountain, Moran Hill and Kylin Villa 1.2 The Status Quo of Cultural Tourism have been built. Resources Heilongjiang Province is a gathering place of minority 1.4 The Current Situation of Ice and Snow Event nationalities, mainly including ten long-dwelling Resources nationalities like the Man, the Meng, the Daur, the In recent years, ice and snow events have also gradually Oroqen, the Hezhen, the Ewenki nationality. And each become an important part of ice and snow tourism. The nationality has traditional winter activities, which have solid ice and heavy snow supply good winter sports their custom characteristics, such as the Ewenki, the venues for Heilongjiang Province, laying a good Oroqen, the Hezhen’s traditional skiing and hunting; the foundation for holding large-scale winter games (speed traditional skating of ethnic minorities of Man, Xibo, skating, short-track speeding skating, figure skating, ice Copyright © Canadian Academy of Oriental and Occidental Culture 54 SUN Xiaochun (2015). Cross-Cultural Communication, 11(8), 53-59 hockey, skiing, curling, etc.) (Xian, 2010). Heilongjiang domestic tourist market, due to the regional differences Province is one of the best regions to conduct ice and and complementarity between the north and the south snow sports competition in our country, which makes areas, people who live in the south are full of curiosity important contribution to the development of ice and about the world that are covered with ice for thousands of snow sports in China.