Ireland aims to attract 175,000 Chinese visitors by 2025

Tourism Ireland is planning to increase the number of the Chinese visitors to the island of Ireland to 175,000 by 2025. This will represent a 150 per cent increase over 2017 in the next eight years.

Around 70,000 Chinese visitors visited Ireland in 2017, which include the Republic of Ireland and Britain’s Northern Ireland. “China is the largest outbound travel market in the world and one that Tourism Ireland is committed to growing over the coming years,” said James Kenny, Tourism Ireland’s Manager China.

“The introduction of the new direct flight from Beijing (to Dublin) next week is a major game-changer and offers a real opportunity for us to build on this number,” he added.

China’s Hainan Airlines is all set to launch a direct Beijing-Dublin flight service on June 12. This is the first direct flight route to be launched between Beijing and Ireland. Earlier this month, a Hong Kong-based airline Cathay Pacific also launched a direct flight service between Hong Kong and Dublin.

“With the launch of these two direct flight routes, we are in a strong position to achieve our Chinese market growth target,” said James Kenny. To tap the potential of the Chinese market, Tourism Ireland has set up four offices in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Chengdu in the Chinese mainland apart from one office in Hong Kong.