Hainan to curb 'whopping housing price'
As of the phenomena that the "whopping prices" for living in hotels in Hainan Province "bluff off" the tourists during the Spring Festival, the government would takes efforts to regulate the market, Wu Kunxiong, deputy director general of the tourism department of Hainan Province said Saturday.
The government will strictly crack down the house speculators and formulate tourism standard to cope with the high prices, according to Wu.
A series of tourism reception standards are to be set up, involving travel agencies, catering, hotels, and guides, to specify the tourism market. Also, the travel information will be open to the public and the precautionary rules will be set up.
Currently, there are 40 five star hotels in Hainan, and 10 to 20 new hotels may be built in 2011 and 2012, which can also ease the current situation, according to Wu.
Wu analyzed that the reasons causing the rocket of the hotel prices in Sanya include the high demand during the Spring Festival holiday, the hotels' aim to offset the insufficient income in low season and profitable speculations.
According to Wu, if let the high prices go, the tourism industry in Hainan will be largely impacted.
Statistics show that the occupancy of the hotels in Sanya during the Spring Festival dropped 2.1 percent compared with that of last year.
However, Wu pointed out that compared with the world's well-known travel destinations like Dubai and Bali Island, the hotel prices in Sanya are not high, and they may gradually rise in the future.