Taiwan tourism & travel  台湾の観光&旅行                                                        ★  The sites world No.1 : 2020,  2017~19,  2016,  2015,  2014,  2013,  2010~12    ★       ★  Top since 1998  ★

home  brief  Taiwan TW  FB  tour  personality  food  medical  restaurants  night markets  buffet  Costco  women  speech  massage  prostitution  watching  judiciary  police  corruption  illegal migrants foreign labor  prosecutors  soft power  death penalty  happiness  housing  avia  image  creativity  human rights  US cartoons  US Design  intl Human rights  judicial persecution  oppression  bully  univ  military  fraud  drugs  democracy
●
jump to   int'l views   restaurants   night-markets  buffet   transportation   massage entertainment   natural beauties   architectures   expenses   art&culture heritage   outlet/shopping   criminal rate
Taiwanese version     Japanese           Korean 　                           pic. left: This websites-group was ranked No.1  by "comment Taiwan travel " on Microsoft Bing  at 8-2-2020, 7-7-2020,  9-4-2018, 6-22-2018  ( 2 items above are ads. ) pic. right : This websites-group was ranked No.1 on Microsoft Bing by "comment Taiwan tour",  8-2-2020,  7-7-2020,  3-7-2019, 9-4-2018, 6-22-2018  　 　      pic. left: No.1 "comment Taiwan tour" on US Google,  7-7-2020, 6-30-2020, 4-5-2020;  pic. right: No.1 "comment Taiwan tourism" on US Google, 7-7-2020, No.1 "comment Taiwan travel" on Google, 6-30-2020, 4-5-2020 　 　 pic. : No.1 "comment Taiwan tour" on Yahoo Japan (largest search engine in Japan), 7-7-2020 　 　 　                    pic. left: No.1 "comment Taiwan tour" on ASK, 7-7-2020, 5-16-2020; pic. : This websites-group was ranked No.1 on ASK by "comment Taiwan tourism", 7-7-2020, 8-27-2019  　 　 pic. :  No.1 "comment Taiwan restaurants" on US google, 7-31-2020,  7-1-2020, 4-2-2020, 12-23-2019 , 1-22-2020 　 　               pic. left: This websites-group was ranked No.1 on US Bing by "comment Taiwan tourism" as well as "comment Taiwan tour" at 7-7-2020, 5-16-2020, 7-11-2019, 3-7-2019, 9-4-2018, 6-22-2018  pic. right : This websites-group was ranked No.1 on US Bing by "comment Taiwan travel",  7-7-2020, 5-16-2020, 7-11-2019, 3-7-2019, 9-4-2018, 6-22-2018 ; No.1 "comment Taiwan tour" , 7-7-2020
pic. left: This websites-group was ranked No.1 on Baidu of China by "comment Taiwan tour", 11-29-2019, 8-3-2019 , No.3 at 5-16-2020 　 　 　 pic. left: This websites-group was ranked No.1 on Baidu of China by "comment Taiwan travel", 8-3-2019	pic. : This websites-group was ranked No.1 on Baidu of China by  "comment Taiwan tourism", 11-29-2019, 8-3-2019, No.3 at 5-16-2020;
pic. upper right: This websites-group was ranked No.1 by "comment Taiwan tour" on US Google, 3-8-2020, 12-3-2019, 11-11-2019; pic. upper left: This websites-group was ranked No.1 by "comment Taiwan tourism" on US Google,  3-8-2020, 12-3-2019, 11-29-2019, 11-11-2019; pic. : This websites-group was ranked No.1 by "comment Taiwan travel" on US Google, 3-8-2020,11-29-2019, 11-11-2019

 ●

◎

               ●   ABC Radio National, Australia, 2-27-2020:  What's most apparent when visiting Taiwan is how ordinary it is — ordinary in the sense of normal, everyday, functional. 
               ●   Liberty Times, 6-15-2020, editorial: Taiwanese always love traveling abroad rather than domestically.  Majority of foreign tourists to Taiwan came from China, but most of their consumption-profits are monopolized by Chinese-funded and Chinese-associated businesses.  All these have made Taiwan's tourism industry weak and sluggish-demanded.  It is undeniable Taiwan tourism needs to be improved the following items :

 New York Times, 7-31-2019, CNN 8-1-2019: China, an Eye on Elections, bans solo tourists from heading to Taiwan.    L.A. Times, 8-1-2019: The indefinite suspension is likely to prove a major economic hit to Taiwan, as well as a blow to cultural interplay.   Independent UK  8-1-2019:  It is a blow for Taiwan’s tourism industry.  Liberty Times 8-28-2019: Taiwan may loss 35,400 million dollars from the gross annual value of tourism in the second half of 2019.    United Daily (8-17-2019, editorial) : Very most part of Taiwan's current tourism difficult situation is caused by cross-Taiwan-Strait policy.    United Daily (8-22-2019, editorial) : Pension reform should be among key issues in Taiwan's tourism, because public servants, military and education field no longer support domestic travel as much as before.    United Daily (8-23-2019) :  Taiwan president Tsai: tourism won't go old route, current policy is to balance tourists flow, stimulate domestic demand, increase consumption-amount, satisfy tourist's appetite by bubble tea and local cuisine.   United Daily (8-28-2019, Focus) :  Visa-free and allowance can save tourism?  Lots of allowances were given to domestic tourists, but the number of Taiwanese traveling overseas hit new high again and again.   Apple Daily, opinion, 12-25-2019: Give up "almozo" policy to promote tourism,  Taiwan should go "quality oriented" route, not waste too much money !    Asia Nikkei 4-30-2019: Since 2016, China has attempted to punish Tsai (DPP) by reducing tour groups to Taiwan, but inbound tourists have steadily set records surpassing 11 millions for the first time last year... ; The United Daily, editorial,  7-15-2019 : An American economist Tyler Cowen was surprised at that Taipei was spinning its wheels, remains 85% unchanged (making smallest differences among Asian cities), motorcycles, small lanes ... everywhere, in contrast, GuangZhou city (廣州) has changed 90%, HK, Seoul, Singapore made huge differences only within 10 years ...;The United Daily 3-7-2019: Taiwan's tourism output value is suffering wallet homicide ! the deficit of foreign exchange is NT1728 billions, the deficit of the number of tourists is 5570 thousands.   The United Daily 10-6-2018 editorial opinion: Taiwan's 'heresy' policy of tourism (subsidies, visa-free) led to 800+ billion dollars decrease of earnings, because of lower consuming ability of South-East Asian tourists and smaller number of Chinese tourists.  Apple Daily,  head-page, 12-31-2018:  The amount of tourists spending per day and the number of days tourists staying decreased.   Washington Post at 1-5-2018: (The Chinese government...) "encouraging Chinese tourism to this island" (ps: during KMT in power ~ 2016 ).    New York Times at 2-22-2018: "The Chinese government has discouraged tourism to Taiwan...".   CTV news 3-9-2018 : beautiful island turns into killing island (traffic accidents), Taiwan's tourism might be a long dark night.   Apple Daily, opinion, 2-12-2018: lacking of monument elements, mature cultural creativity, and inexpensive tour-site hotels ...  shallow, careless, low-end quality led to an extremely low return visitor rate to Taiwan.   Apple Daily, Headline news 1-15-2018:  Taiwan tourism collapsed like a snow-slide, the number of tourists to Kenting National Park(墾丁貓鼻頭) dropped 59%,  to Taroko National Gorge (太魯閣) dropped 43%, etc, because of the number of Chinese tourists declined a lot and local people don't like those sites -  Apple Daily opinion 1-17-2018: expensive hotels, crowded traffic, getting ripped-off by greedy shops' ... UDN opinion 4-11-2018: tourism-related business everywhere are complaining of great hardship (齊喊苦).   food safety issues never end /  The China Times,  editorial 10-20-2018, UDN editorial 12-4-2018.   The United Daily 12-10-2018: tourism deficit expansion!  The number of Taiwanese traveling abroad is more than that of tourists to Taiwan.   

     unlike many others , this website won't give you fake  information or beautified pictures !

●

◆   One of the most underrated tourist destinations in Asia ?

World Economic Forum (WEF)  <Travel and tourism competitiveness report> released at 9-4-2019 shows Taiwan had the sub-region's largest decline in competitiveness from 30th down to 37th.   In the overall ranking list, Asian country Japan got No.4,  China No.13,  Hong Kong No.14,  Korea No.16, Singapore No.17,  Malaysia No.29,  Thailand No.31,  UAE  No.33,  India No. 34,... (ps: secret hackers attacked while my updating WEF report of 2019)
　

According to  World Economic Forum (WEF)  <Travel and tourism competitiveness report> (released at 4-6-2017), Taiwan's most important indexes for promoting tourism, like "Attractiveness of Natural Assets" (parks, beaches, mountains, wildlife, etc) ranks world No.87, "Natural Resources" ranks No.55,   "Environmental Sustainability" ranks No.75 (No.69 in 2015), "Price Competitiveness" ranks No. 46, "Hotel Price Index" ranks No. 89 (82 in 2015), Taiwan got "n/a" on China's strong indexes such as "World heritage natural sites" as well as "World heritage cultural sites" (world top 5).  Taipei mayor Ko just mocked tourism of Hong Kong and Singapore, however, they are very ahead in "Business Environment" and "Ground & Port infrastructure" (world top 2), "Airport  infrastructure" (world No.5 & 6 vs Taiwan no. 42 ), "Safety & security" ( No.5 and No.6 ) 。 Taiwan has excellent scores on "Mobile Network coverage", "ATM", etc, but those least likely are main attractiveness to international sightseers that Taiwan needs most.  According to government statistics "visitor arrivals by purpose in 2016",  only 7.61% foreigners came for business, conference, exhibition, most visitors are for pleasure, so we should not focus on WEF's overall score and ranking for Taiwan. 

China remaining the top source of tourists to Taiwan is because,  LA Times at 8-1-2019 said that (1) satisfying a curiosity, an important channel for knowing Taiwan (2) flights of no more than 2~3 hours (3) strong cultural and deep historic connection (4) religious, architectural and cultural similarities, the result of migration from China to Taiwan that began hundreds of years ago (5) take home new information from Taiwan’s newspapers, news websites and television channels, all free of censorship unlike on the mainland (6) stoking business.   How about the current status of Taiwan's tourism industries?  Liberty Times (10-31-2019): It's no fun traveling domestically, more Taiwanese would rather spend lots of money on traveling overseas.   Apple Daily (8-3-2019) commented that in these years Taiwan's travel and tourism still rely on old low strategies like price-cutting competition, cut-throat competition, or even ripping-tourists-off frauds...; Apple Daily (8-10-2019 論壇) wrote the city view of Shi-Mun-Din(西門町, a major tourism site) of Taipei is messy, even worse than some cities of South-East Asia.  United Daily (8-2-2019) said Taiwanese government's allowances given to citizens only cure the symptom not the disease, the budget should be used to improve tourism environment and to build up tourism body, e.g.,  facilities & infrastructure - we only have very little South-East Asian tourists friendly stuffs for them...   UDN (8-23-2019), scholar criticized Taiwan tourism counts on slogans and small-eats of night markets, without a long-term plan.  

●

BBC UK, The SUN (2-13-2017):  "Bus Crash Horror !" -  Taiwan's "safety standards need to be improved".   A few days later another fatal tour-bus accident occurred.   The major official newspaper of the ruling Chinese Communist Party, People's Daily  (8-4-2016 editorial ):  <Chinese tourists not dare to visit Taiwan in the future  without safety assurance>  / Taiwan tour disasters are sort of man-made disasters , Taiwan tourism's major problems  include loopholes in law and regulation 、careless mistakes in administration or not-good-enough system of organization, other malpractices are traveling load-bearing capacity (旅遊承載能力)、road-traffic safety 、aviation safety 、road maintenance 、safety standard for tour bus 、Modified Automobiles/Fix-up tour bus、Low-end tour groups … tragic accidents happening again and again open Pandora's box, too many tourist victims reveal Taiwan tourism's problems, Taiwan authority tried to do something (亡羊補牢) each time a tragic accident occurred, but it seemed late and same kind of tragedies never cease.    A big gas-cylinder LPG-explosion in Fengjia (逢甲) night market (known as largest night-market business district in Taiwan) proved this again, the China Times (7-19-2017) lashed out all this sort of night-market districts across Taiwan have similar safety problem, enforcement officials even don't know  which is more important - grass-roots' (common-people) making money or public security.  Food safety is another major issue, good-taste is not equal to safety, Taiwan's most famous Toxicology expert & professor Yin M.D. (顏宗海, U. London ) advised that "Minimize the times of dining out to protect your health !". 

●

Taiwan has never reached top 20 in  <Travel and tourism competitiveness report> in past years.  In 2020, Taiwan ranks the 10th among Asian countries.   Taiwanese media always reported one overall ranking based on all indexes, but, only about 7% of international visitors came Taiwan for business purpose (Liberty Times, official statistics, 9-5-2015), about 85% Chinese visited Taiwan for tourism (recreation, pleasure) purpose, so Taiwan needs to focus those tourism-related indexes in world reports.  According to <Travel and tourism competitiveness report> of 2015,   Taiwan's index "Prioritization of Travel & Tourism" was ranked world No.82,  "Country Brand Strategy" was ranked world No. 125,   the ranking of "Tourist service infrastructure" is No. 77,  "Quality of Natural Environment" is No.75, "Environmental Sustainability" No.69, "Natural Resource" No.62,  "Hotel Price Index" is world No. 82,  "Travel and tourism industry development" is No. 53, "Airport Density" No.113, besides, "World heritage natural sites" and "World heritage cultural sites"  both n/a are put in the last position.  Will world tourists come for some Taiwan's high-score items, e.g., "quality of railroad" (world No.7), " internet users" (world No.24) ?   Taiwan likely lack confidence in its travel sights and historic spots, a latest tourism advertisement (by John Wu &  Kimura Takuya, costs USD 1.7 million, Sept.-Dec. 2015) being broadcasted in Japan targets small-eaters, instead of sightseers.    Besides, World Economic Forum gave a high score to Taiwan's "HIV prevalence" (Taiwan dropped to No.59 in 2017's report),  but WEF forgot Taiwan is notorious for HIV and AIDS Social Stigma issue, USA Country Reports on Human Rights practices (released at 6.26.2015) stated 60 percent of HIV carriers in Taiwan left their jobs due to coercion and bullying ( ●  Taiwanese personality ).  The United Nations (UNAIDS) concerns about AIDS patients' education human rights in Taiwan (July 2016).    Years ago Taiwan banned, but communist China welcomed Basketball Hall of Famer Earvin "Magic" Johnson.

●

Referring to another global famous report, 2014/2015 <Country Brands Index>, Taiwan's score is below average perceptions in both the Status and Experience dimensions (indexes  including "Value for money", "Range of attractions", "Resort & lodging options", "Would like to visit for a vacation", "Food"; "Historical points of interest", "Heritage", "art & culture", "Natural beauty", etc).

Some other Asian countries without rich heritages (similar to Taiwan) reached excellent achievements on tourism & travel.  On 2015's <Travel and tourism competitiveness report>, Japan's ranking is world No.9 (Prime Minster Abe is building the nation upon tourism strategy), Singapore No.11, Hong Kong No.13, mainland China No.17, on the list of 2011, Singapore was ranked world No.10, Hong Kong No.12, Australia No. 13, New Zealand No. 19, Japan No.22, Korea No. 32, Malaysia No.35.    
◎

United Daily News TV (8-23-2015, 8:00 pm, Taiwan) commented tourism is related to a country's living conditions, and analyzed many Taiwanese had trips to Japan because they love to experience high living environment (comments by SHU professor Chen J. Y.).  But, UK's Economist Intelligence Unit ― "Liveability Cities" report (Aug. 2015) ranks Taipei world No.60 (Taipei's Tourism leader 簡余晏 8-20-2015 expressed the ranking will go up in next year, hopefully), Mercer's "Quality of Living" ranks Taipei world No. 83, and gives another city Tai-Chung world No.99, Monocle's "Quality of Life" top list includes no Taipei.   The China Times reported (9-21-2015) air pollution ( PM10 : 41ug/m3 ) and environmental quality in Taiwan both were ranked almost the last position in OECD countries.  (by Directorate General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics, Executive Yuan, R.O.C. TAIWAN)   Taiwan university - college of Public health's associate dean: Taiwan's PM2.5 air-pollution-control standard is 15 years behind, and hence create a legitimate environment to kill people (1-4-2016 L.T. http://news.ltn.com.tw/news/life/paper/945998).   BBC UK, The SUN (2-13-2017): Taiwan's travel transportation "safety standards need to be improved".

◎
◆   One of the fastest-growing tourist destinations in the world

In spite of these bad scores, MasterCard study (6-2015), in terms of the number of international overnight visitor arrivals last year, ranked Taipei 11th in the world and sixth in the Asia-Pacific region (ps: see tbl below).  Taipei is fast-growing tourist destination over the past five years.  The annual growth rate 14.9％ is ranked world No.1, In terms of international tourist spending last year, Taipei was ranked 11th in the world and fifth in the Asia-Pacific region. Last year, international tourists in Taipei spent US$9.28 billion  (Taipei Times, 6-6-2015) .  Euromonitor International released at 1-28-2017 "Top 100 City Destinations" ranking in terms of international tourist arrivals in 2015, Taipei ranks No. 14 (higher than Tokyo , Seoul), Taichung No. 97. (No.1 Hong Kong, No.2 Bangkok, No. 4 Singapore, No. 6 Macau)

Taiwan's tourism has been evaluated as non competitiveness, but surprisingly attracts huge number of tourists and money, Why  ?

The Washington Post at 1-5-2018: (The Chinese government...) "encouraging Chinese tourism to this island".    The China Times (中國時報, 7-14-2015) points out, increasing communist Chinese tourists led to Taiwan's fast growth on tourism. ( 這「反映出開放陸客的成果」。)  In accordance with the Liberty Times(7-7-2015), the number of Chinese tourists is 90,000 in 2008, 540,000 in 2009, 3,330,000 in 2014 (ps: correct number should be : 3,987,152), besides, tourists from China's Hong Kong & Macau (1,375,770 persons) also help a lot.   Is this part of communist China's widely-known political policy "Allowance of profits" to Taiwan("讓利"政策)? 

◎
◆   Alarm-bell sounds ?!

New York Times at 2-22-2018: "The Chinese government has discouraged tourism to Taiwan...". (since DPP in office, around 2016 )

Before that, some Taiwanese Legislators worried and criticized (7-7-2015) that Taiwan's tourism depending on red Chinese tourists may causes serious national security problems  ――  They probably reminded of Japanese "tours for advice & information" ("參謀旅行") before having invaded China in WWII.   The China Times (5-15-2017): Losing huge number of Chinese tourists resulted in closing many local businesses (hotels, travel agencies, tour bus companies, shopping stores ).  CTI TV news(5-16-2017, 9:30am): Chinese tourists' amount of daily consumption  is USD 120, other countries' average amount USD 48;  However, The New York Times (5-18-2017):  a declining number of Chinese tourists can be offset, to some extent, with visitors from other Asian markets.   The United Daily (8-27-2016) editorial: The relationship between Taiwan and China falling back leads to a misery & cutting-throat situation of tourism industry, and soon will affect other related industries - hotel, aviation, restaurants and retails.   The China Times(12-19-2016): Taiwan's tourism industry looks like a great boom, but tourism business refuted it " all are fake !"...  Taiwan should worries and needs diversification of risk :  attracting new tourists ― Korean, South-East Asian, Middle-Easterners, Westerners, instead of putting all eggs in one basket ― expecting more Chinese tourists.

It's a challenge !  official report found the number of American tourists is only 458,691, Euro. tourists even fewer - only 264,880 (UDN TV (8-23-2015): many westerners regard Taiwan as an electronics factory ... ) .   The total number of Westerners is only 1/7 ~1/8 the number of Chinese tourists.   Taiwan also failed to attract Asians/Easterners other than Japan (1,634,790 persons),  even Taiwanese prefer traveling overseas, in last year, the number of tourists visiting Taiwan is 9.91 million, but Taiwanese went overseas is up to 11.84 million, foreign countries earned Taiwanese money 159.6 billion. 

Why?? and what's the solution?
◎

TVBS (7-14-2015, 9-15-2015 8:59pm) : scholars and officials advised cultural creativity cooperating with tourism, and enhancing soft power to promote Taiwan's tourism industry.  But according to UK based Monocle's global Soft Power Survey (2010/2011~2020), Taiwan's soft power even lost mainland China, and some other Asian countries, including Japan, South Korea, Australia, Singapore, New Zealand, India, UAE.    Taiwan also failed to be listed in 2018's Soft Power 30 Study by USC Center on Public Diplomacy in July 2018 and  2017's Soft Power 30 Study, compiled by PR company Portand Communication and University of Southern California.  Taiwanese government focused on political elections rather than cultural issues for years, soft power won't grow big overnight.

Unlike some tourism websites' beautified, glamor photo & words (ps 00), this non-profit site gives only true info. and unbiased critiques on Taiwan's tourism & travel.  Some small countries'  (Croatia, Hong Kong (14.16%), Jordan, Thailand(10.87%)) proportion of tourism income in GDP reached more than 10%, Malaysia, Singapore reached 7%~8% (ref. Liberty Times 10-22-2015, UDN TV 8-23-2015), certainly Taiwan needs forward thinking instead of focusing on "short-swing trading" & benefit, which may harm tourism industry, Taiwan requires accelerating the improvements of those weak elements mentioned in this web-site, so as to ignore the pressures (UDN, 2-25-2016: the number of tour-groups Chinese tourists may reduce 30%~60% daily) from China for political reasons.   

United Daily, opinion, 12-30-2017 : Taiwan's foreign exchange earnings from tourism decreased 300 billion dollars.  To promote tourism just in number of tourists, Taiwan's new mission “New Southbound Policy”  gave up the national principle of mutual benefit and equality, the "side-effect" the policy brought in illegal drug trafficking and illegal foreign workers.    An article by College of Comm., National ChengChi Univ. (5-10-2019) noted Taiwan tries to attract SouthEast Asian tourists by “New Southbound Policy” , but they cannot replace Chinese tourists because the number of tourists increases, the amount they spent are less ... ref. to   newslab.nccu.edu.tw/zh_tw/showcase/video/陸客不來了-新南向政策能否為台灣觀光業帶來轉機-74424413  Taiwan's advertisements only focus on "cheat eats" by using some widely-known stars.  

◎

Woody Allen described New York as " beautiful women ...", in contrast, a money-oriented Taiwan can not build the country an elegant graceful "woman".   To promote tourism, Taiwan probably need to use tourists' curiosity (works only once or at most twice), or to attract 'lower class' people, or still need China's "encouraging Chinese tourism" ― communist's political policy "Allowance of profits".

◆   Taiwanese health is much important than making tourism money, Taiwan adm. should put more efforts on  food safety and pollution issues.

◎
◎

Although Telegraph (Jan. 2017) mentioned Taipei's  "pioneering creative scene",  however, in fact ......

● Pic. above-left: Taiwan's college paper, professor, and tourism leader both advised : “culture is absolute a value-added & critical element in Taiwan Tourism industry” (United Daily, 12-11-2015).   Scholar comments that Taiwan needs attractions - better cultural creativity (The United Daily 12-21-2015).  TVBS (7-14-2015, 9-15-2015) : scholars and official advised Taiwanese cultural creativity cooperating with tourism, and  enhancing soft power to save Taiwan tourism.  The China Times (9-20-2015) editorial : "Culture (ps: cultural creativity) is best element to establish a country brand".  However, Taiwan's cultural creativity is poor.   For instance, pic. left is the logo of Taiwan government, since 11-9-1993, next 3 are logo of Canadian Pacific Rail, since 1968 till out-of-flavour, so it's a cheap-copy suspect.   Taiwan's official document states their logo "easy to identify and associate with Taiwan's brand ... a simple shape and modernized & internationalized, aesthetic design " ; but, exactly on the contrary, it's neither modernized, nor as aesthetical simple as CPR's logo... 

● Pic. above-right : Taiwan's another 2 official logos have similar problems ― easy to be associated with world famous logos.
● Government took the lead to plagiarize, and ignored copy-rights, Taiwan becomes "an island of Plagiarism" / Liberty Times 4-6-2016.

◎◎   understand Taiwan   in 1 minute  !!       TAIWAN            review Taiwan          comment Taiwan       No.1 rankings on the net   !
◎