This Spring Festival season, Hainan's tourism market has been on fire. Hainan's enthusiasm for welcoming tourists has gradually overflowed from the classic destinations of Haikou and Sanya to more and more destinations such as Wanning ( a county-level city in the southeastern part of the island), Wenchang (a county-level city in the northeastern corner of the province), Qionghai (the eastern seaboard county-level city at the mouth of the Wanquan River), and the Lingshui Li Autonomous County (Sanya's eastern neighbor). The consumer market in these and other counties has also picked up a lot of steam.

"Since New Year's Day, the number of travelers coming to Wenchang has steadily increased with a huge peak during the Chinese New Year holiday,” said Mr Weng, a supermarket owner in Wencheng Town. According to him, his small shop has had a huge number of online and offline sales during the Spring Festival thanks to the influx of tourists. "Our take-away orders for the seven days of the Spring Festival accounted for about a third of the entire month of January's income,” said he.

Tourists enjoy a helicopter tour of the beautiful scenery in Wanning's Shimei Bay, on 22 January. [Yuan Chen/Hainan Daily]

According to data from retail platform Meituan, the growth rate of instant retail orders in Hainan counties during this year's Spring Festival reached 64%. Supplied by small shops in the local county towns, these instant orders quickly become additional income for the small shops.

Taking Wanning as an example, during this year's Spring Festival holiday, Wanning's booming tourism industry had a total of 651,000 tourists (up 29.84% year on year) and tourism revenue of RMB 412 million (up 35.84% year on year).

"I have been to Sanya many times. It is nice, but too popular and too packed. This year, Lingshui is our choice for a new route,” explained Li Yachi, a tourist from Beijing. She and her family said they really liked the warmth and coziness of the island especially for the Chinese New Year holiday. "Lingshui is also becoming popular now. The scenery here is quite attractive and well worth a visit.”

Hainan Island is blessed with an excellent ecological environment, beautiful landscapes and a wealth of tourism resources. Taking the lead in receiving the tourism overflow from Sanya and Haikou, counties and county-level cities such as Wenchang, Wanning, Qionghai and Lingshui are becoming popular tourist destinations.

The improvement of Hainan's overall infrastructure also provides a strong foundation for the development of Hainan's county-level consumer market. Benefiting from the improvement of infrastructure, Hainan's county-level tourism market has been developing rapidly, and it has effectively taken over the radiation and drive from popular cities such as Sanya and Haikou.

"Although Lingshui is not as big as a big tourist city like Sanya, it is also very convenient for consumption," said Li. While travelling, she ordered sanitary napkins, slippers and sun hats via online take-out as conveniently as in the city.

Hainan's tourism industry insiders said that, even though the Spring Festival holiday has passed, the enthusiasm for tourism in Hainan is expected to continue until March, and the tourism market at the county level will continue to show strong consumption potential.