A beautiful night view of Nanning, Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region. [Photo by Song Yankang/Nanning Daily]

Nanning, capital city of South China's Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region, has explored deeply tapping the nighttime economic potential of its cultural tourism market to promote winter tourism, achieving initial positive results.

According to the 2019 China Urban Nighttime Economy Impact Report, which was jointly released by Tencent and Xinhua News Agency on Dec 6, 2019, Nanning ranks 13th among the 50 nighttime economic influential cities in the country.

Nanning has attracted 12.2 million visitors since it launched its "Winter Tour to Guangxi" event, a year-on-year increase of 16.15 percent. Tourism consumption has reached 14.19 billion yuan ($2.04 billion), a year-on-year increase of 24.43 percent, and the number of overnight visitors has increased by 3.88 percent year-on-year.

The event posted real-time cultural travel information through 51 media outlets and gained about 850 million views in a month. Various cultural and tourism activities were held during the event, including 75 cultural performances, several exhibitions and cultural displays, 18 tourism festivals, as well as seven tourism food festivals, which met the comprehensive needs of nighttime tourists.

Nanning also introduced preferential travel policies during the event. From November to December 2019, preferential airfare policies were launched for airport routes from Nanning to Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Guilin, and Kunming. Five tourism direct trains to Nanning involving attractions like Qingxiu Mountain, Yongjiang River, and Daming Mountain have been opened to provide tourists with one-stop destination travel services.

Tourists take a night cruise on the Yongjiang River in Nanning. [Photo by Wei Qiao/Nanning Daily]