Hotels in St Petersburg told to offer noodle stations as part of Russia's plan to lure more Chinese tourists
Sergei Mikhailichenko/Getty Images
- Russia is trying to lure more Chinese visitors to support its struggling tourism industry.
- Authorities are partnering with officials in China to offer training for Russian hoteliers.
- They will include language courses and traditional cuisine, an official told TASS.
Since Vladimir Putin decided almost a year ago to start a war with neighboring Ukraine, Russia has not been high on most Westerners' must-visit lists.
Its tourism industry has been struggling as a result, and Russian authorities think they might have a partial answer to the problem.
They want to attract more tourists from China by encouraging hotels to provide traditional cuisine and offer things like noodle stations at breakfast.
Authorities in St Petersburg, Russia's second-biggest city, are working with Chinese officials to create specialist training programs on how to "work correctly" with guests from China, Sergei Korneev, chairman of the city's tourism development committee, told the state news agency TASS.
This will involve language training as well as traditional cuisine. Local authorities will tell hotels and tour operators that "there must be a noodle station," said Korneev.
In January, China finally resumed overseas group tours after almost three years of COVID-19 restrictions effectively cut the country off from the rest of the world. China has a list of 20 approved countries for group travel — including Russia, Thailand, Cuba, and Argentina.
The first post-pandemic Chinese tour group is expected to arrive in St Petersburg from Guangzhou on February 25, per TASS.
St Petersburg has traditionally been Russia's most popular tourist destination. Authorities hope that an influx of Chinese tourists could support its faltering tourism industry after the Ukraine invasion almost completely wiped out visitors from the West.
Just 201,000 foreign tourists travelled to Russia last year, per data from the Association of Tour Operators of Russia, which analyzed statistics from the country's border force. That's 4.9 million fewer tourists than in 2019.
It's also lower than 2021, when 288,300 international tourists visited Russia even at the peak of pandemic-related restrictions.
Chinese tourists were big pre-pandemic business for St Petersburg. In 2019, there were 957,000 Chinese visitors to the city, accounting for 9.2% of the total, according to data from its tourism development committee, cited by TASS.
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