The 15th UNWTO/PATA Forum on Tourism Trends and Outlook was held both online and on-site in Guilin, Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region, on Oct 15, bringing officials, experts and scholars from the tourism sector from all over the world.

Pressing issues related to tourism and rural development such as the construction of beautiful rural areas and the development of rural tourism were discussed during the event.

The forum is the only international meeting held by the World Tourism Organization of the United Nations in the Chinese mainland annually and has been held in Guilin for 14 times.

Zhou Jiabin, Party secretary of Guilin, said that the city will make full use of the forum to develop the tourism industry and take an active part in discovering a new model for the integrated development of tourism and rural development.

Guangxi received 437 million person-times of tourists with an overall tourism consumption of 493.3 billion yuan ($76.3 billion) in the first half of 2021, each recovering to 102.5 percent and 99.4 percent of the level in 2019 before the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Officials said that Guangxi will further expand opening-up and enhance communication and cooperation with international tourism organizations such as the UNWTO and the Pacific Asia Travel Association to promote the high-quality development of rural tourism.

Zurab Pololikashvili, secretary-general of the UNWTO, said that Guilin has made great contributions to the sustainable development of tourism and has become a tourism research center in the Asia-Pacific.