Visa ease smooths path for savvy countries to benefit from Chinese tourism

By Chen Chenchen Source:Global Times Published: 2013-5-22 23:13:02

Visa procedures undoubtedly mirror the relationship between two countries. The more intimate the two countries are, the more efficient the visa procedures between them can be.

But there is also another side of the coin: Visa issuance can also be a micro index of a country's own level of development and opening-up.

I felt this deeply the moment I walked into the South Korean visa center in Beijing. In recent couple of years, many countries, including the UK, Germany, Italy, Russia and Australia, have simplified visa application procedures for Chinese citizens, especially tourists.

South Korea has also shown a quick response to China's growing status as a tourist colossus. For tourists from eight urban districts of Beijing, the only items they need to submit are a photo and an application form.

For foreigners who are new to a country, the visa center is the first aspect of the country they experience. Like all consular functions, it's a projection of the country's image and organization. Almost all the indicators that are used to measure a country's development are tangible here. Efficiency, order, policy sensitivity, and the transparency and predictability of procedures are all crystal clear.

It is interesting to watch the status of applicants at visa centers. Almost all my friends who have recently been to Southeast or Central Asian countries grumbled about the rigmarole of visa services. Getting a visa seems to be the main headache when making a trip.

Every morning in Beijing, applicants to Southeast Asian countries, most of them Western backpackers, can be seen sitting on the ground, waiting outside the visa offices. When the opening time approaches, there is a rush to acquire a scrap of paper on which a handwritten number could be found.

This is certainly not unfamiliar to the Chinese, who themselves are experiencing social transformation. They are at ease and may appear disordered at the visa centers of some developing nations, but they can also be quiet and efficient at the visa service offices of some developed countries.

The difference actually lies in the guidance and atmosphere of visa centers themselves.

Take the South Korean visa service center again. When one passes the security gate, walks into a comfortable waiting room, finds various forms, samples and stationery orderly displayed and easily accessible, and quickly goes through the necessary procedures before the polite lady delivers you a receipt informing you the time and date to fetch your visa, one may sincerely admit this is also a facet, though a small one, of soft power.

It has been long complained that a Chinese passport is one of the most useless in the world. The era in which the Chinese were automatically viewed as suspicious when traveling is far from being a past. But after all, visas are not going to make China stumble in its quest to go global.

A recent movie, American Dreams in China, shows how the Chinese in the 1980s were embarrassed facing bloody-minded US visa officers. That is gradually becoming a thing of the past.

According to reports in countries like the US and South Korea, Chinese travelers invariably rank top in either consumption or visa application numbers. More and more countries are striving to accommodate the Chinese enthusiasm to go abroad while ensuring basic security.

Western countries can still be reflexively paranoid when dealing with Chinese applicants, afraid of migrants seeking illicit work overseas. But the lure of money is strong.

Each summer, as heat waves hit Beijing, another wave of tourism pours forth. In office corridors or beside water dispensers, chats about getting visas become increasingly frequent. It is too ideal to expect all countries to grant Chinese applicants great convenience in getting visas.

However, those do grant such convenience have seized the initiative.

The author is an opinion editor with the Global Times. chenchenchen@globaltimes.com.cn


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