China’s reopening after its protracted zero-covid policy is good news for Australia’s economy. An economist from the American bank JPMorgan Chase has calculated that Chinese students and tourists could help that country with almost a percentage point of extra economic growth over the next two years.
He said Beijing’s move is “clearly beneficial”, especially for Australia’s services sector – including the hospitality industry – and retail. According to Tom Kennedy, who works for JPMorgan based in Sydney, a gradual recovery in Chinese tourist and student numbers to 2019 levels could add 0.5 and 0.4 percentage points to the gross domestic product (GDP).
Australia is usually a popular destination for Chinese tourists and youth who want to study abroad. But unfortunately, due to the corona pandemic and the strict corona policy that China has maintained for a long time, this contribution to the Australian economy has dried up over the past year. But Beijing is expected to relax its corona rules for travellers again on Sunday. Then it will be easier for Chinese people to travel abroad again.
The latter does cause a lot of concern worldwide. China has recently been struggling with a major corona outbreak again. Many countries have now announced new travel restrictions for travellers from China, given a large number of corona infections in the Asian country. For example, people coming to the Netherlands from China will need a negative corona test next Tuesday.
