Shanghai launches international consumption season to attract global tourists

Shanghai officially kicked off its inaugural Summer international consumption season on Saturday, aiming to entice foreign visitors to explore the city's diverse offerings.

The Shanghai Summer international consumption season promises an exciting lineup of seven flagship events with a strong international appeal. Highlights include the "Top of the Pyramid: Ancient Egyptian Civilization Exhibition," the City Walk Pro Shanghai Urban Experience season, and the first-ever Shanghai International Light Festival.

Adding to the calendar of the consumption season is the inaugural Shanghai International Cruise Festival, which will set sail on August 2. Since the start of the year, Shanghai's cruise port has handled 126 inbound and outbound cruise ships, accommodating nearly 630,000 passengers in total.

As inbound tourism heats up, China's financial hub of Shanghai is welcoming an influx of international visitors. Official data have revealed a significant surge in foreign visitor arrivals in Shanghai in the first half of the year. From January to June, Shanghai registered 2.035 million international tourist arrivals via its port, marking an approximate 2.8-times increase compared to the same period last year.

Recognizing this trend, Shanghai is steadfast in its efforts to cater to these visitors.

A standout attraction this summer is the Yu Garden, which has become a vibrant hotspot featuring a stunning naked-eye 3D display of a giant panda and a 3D projection light show. This blend of tradition and cutting-edge technology offers an unparalleled experience for both domestic and international tourists.

"I live in Ireland, in Europe. I've been in China now for roughly ten days here. I came during the day as well when it wasn't as beautiful as now, but I was recommended to come back at nighttime as well. I think it's absolutely amazing. The architecture is just amazing and astonishing as well. The panda is obviously such a symbolic sign of China, and I suppose that it promotes Chinese culture in a very pleasant way," said Irish tourist Miguel.

"I come from Melbourne. We've been in China for about a week now. We want to see it at night time. It looks very very nice, with all the lights beneath the temples. Very different to Melbourne where we come from. The Chinese nightlife is much more alive than in Melbourne. It's a very nice and a different culture," said Australian tourist Charlie.

In addition to these efforts, Shanghai is enhancing its comprehensive service guarantees to meet the needs of visitors regarding transportation, accommodation, sightseeing, dining, and shopping. Many companies are also offering incentives such as international roaming data cards and discounted hotel tickets.

Shanghai launches international consumption season to attract global tourists

Shanghai launches international consumption season to attract global tourists

The population of golden-haired monkeys, or snub-nosed monkeys, at a reserve in southwest China's Yunnan Province has been steadily increasing as conservation authorities adopt new technologies to protect wildlife and boost biodiversity.

The 2,821-square-kilometer Baima Snow Mountain National Nature Reserve sits in the core zone of the Three Parallel Rivers of the Yunnan Protected Areas, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The reserve stands as an exemplary model for the province's efforts to protect the Yunnan snub-nosed monkeys, an endangered species unique to China.

New digital technologies are playing an increasingly vital role in this initiative. Among them is a set of weight scales readable by remote control, which were added to the national nature reserve this year to more effectively monitor the health status of the monkeys.

A total of 11 new baby monkeys were born this year, said staff, adding that their current weights are within the normal range and they are all in good health.

In addition to monitoring the monkey's weight changes, they collect and detect the feces of the primates every season to learn about their physical condition, said Lai Jiandong, head of the wildlife rescue station at the reserve.

Conservationists also use cutting-edge advances to collect exhaustive data on the monkeys' habitat.

"The technology we are utilizing is laser radar, and its advantage is that it can create a three-dimensional reconstruction of the Yunnan snub-nosed monkeys' habitat. This enables us to assess the habitat quality of the monkeys over a larger area, compared with traditional remote sensing methods, which rely solely on imagery or ground-based manual surveys. The traditional methods cannot reflect the three-dimensional habitat of the Yunnan snub-nosed monkeys," explained Yang Haitao, an associate researcher at the Institute of Remote Sensing and GIS under Peking University.

This year, the nature reserve has also reintroduced 40 Yunnan snub-nosed monkeys to the wild in order to promote genetic exchange. The group of 40 Yunnan golden hair monkeys includes three families and one group of males, with the youngest being just three months old.

Data showed that the Yunnan snub-nosed monkey population in the Baima Snow Mountain National Nature Reserve has increased from nearly 500 individuals when the nature reserve was established in 1983 to roughly 2,500 individuals at present, making up 65 percent of the total population of the species in China.

Dubbed "elves of the snow mountain", Yunnan snub-nosed monkeys live in the mountainous forests of Yunnan and the neighboring Tibet Autonomous Region. They are listed as national first-class rare and endangered protected species in China and as vulnerable on the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List.

New technologies help monitor endangered snub-nosed monkeys in Yunnan