On January 4, the State Administration of Radio and Television issued the "Notice on the Implementation of the "Micro-Short Drama +" Action Plan to Empower All Industries." It mentioned that the "Notice on Carrying Out the "Following Micro-Short Dramas to Travel" Creation Plan" should be implemented, and continue to focus on eight creative directions: rural revitalization, famous cities, towns and villages, industrial parks, traditional culture, national cultural parks, urban attractions, and natural landscapes, to carry out the "Following Micro-Short Dramas to Travel" creation plan. In 2025, about 100 key works will be created and launched, exploring more new models of integration of "micro-short dramas + cultural tourism," and better guiding the advantages of micro-short drama traffic into industrial and market advantages.

On January 12, the General Office of the State Council forwarded the Ministry of Ecology and Environment's "Opinions on the Implementation of the Construction of a Pioneer Zone for Beautiful China." This document clarifies that the pioneer zones for Beautiful China will be constructed in a graded and classified manner. By the end of 2027, a number of achievements in practical innovation and institutional innovation will be formed, and several exemplary models that are beautiful in their own way and satisfactory to the masses will be built through persistent efforts, accumulating experience and setting benchmarks for the comprehensive advancement of the construction of Beautiful China.

On January 20, in order to fully implement the spirit of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China and the second and third plenary sessions of the 20th Central Committee, thoroughly implement Xi Jinping's Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, further deepen the reform of the cultural system and mechanism, and promote the high-quality development of culture, the General Office of the State Council recently issued the "Several Economic Policies on Promoting High-Quality Development of Culture," mainly clarifying policy measures in seven aspects.

On January 22, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the State Council issued the "Rural Comprehensive Revitalization Plan (2024-2027)" and issued a notice requiring all regions and departments to earnestly implement it in conjunction with their actual situations. The plan proposes that by 2027, substantial progress will be made in rural comprehensive revitalization, and agricultural and rural modernization will reach a new stage; by 2035, decisive progress will be made in rural comprehensive revitalization, agricultural modernization will be basically achieved, and rural areas will basically have modern living conditions.

On February 11, nine departments including the Ministry of Commerce, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, and China State Railway Group issued the "Action Plan to Increase the Number of Silver-Haired Tourist Trains to Promote the Development of Service Consumption." It clearly proposes that by 2027, a silver-haired tourist train product system covering the whole country, with diverse routes, rich themes, and comprehensive services will be built, the service standard system for silver-haired tourist trains will be basically established, a number of themed tourist train brands will be formed, and the number of silver-haired tourist trains and passenger transport volume will achieve a significant increase compared with 2024. This means that the silver-haired tourist train market will usher in a period of rapid expansion in the next few years, and there is huge development space in train operation, tourism route development, and related service provision.

Full Text | The "Action Plan to Increase the Number of Silver-Haired Tourist Trains to Promote the Development of Service Consumption" Released

On February 19, five departments including the State Administration for Market Regulation, the National Development and Reform Commission, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the Ministry of Commerce, and the Ministry of Culture and Tourism issued the "Optimization of Consumption Environment Three-Year Action Plan (2025-2027)", starting from five actions: improving the quality of consumption supply, optimizing consumption order, improving consumption rights protection, co-governance of consumption environment, and leading consumption environment, to boost consumer confidence.

On February 23, the No. 1 Central Document of 2025, "Opinions of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the State Council on Further Deepening Rural Reform and Solidly Promoting Rural Comprehensive Revitalization," was officially released. This is the 22nd No. 1 Central Document guiding the work of "agriculture, rural areas, and farmers" since 2004. The Opinions are divided into six parts, with a total of 30 measures.

On March 13, 2024, based on the "Grading of Tourism and Leisure Districts" (LB/T 082-2021), a national standard of the People's Republic of China's tourism industry, 40 districts were recognized as the fourth batch of national-level tourism and leisure districts after being recommended by the relevant provincial (autonomous region, municipal) cultural and tourism administrative departments, and after the Ministry of Culture and Tourism organized the identification and completed the announcement according to the procedure.

On March 16, 2024, the General Office of the CPC Central Committee and the General Office of the State Council issued the "Special Action Plan to Boost Consumption," which proposed 30 specific measures in eight areas to address the prominent contradictions restricting consumption, many of which involve culture and tourism.

On March 17, 2024, the General Office of the National Development and Reform Commission and other departments issued the "Notice on Doing a Good Job in the Construction of High-Quality Outdoor Sports Destinations," promoting the implementation and refinement of work in six areas: resource utilization, facility construction, service upgrades, event development, industrial integration, and safety governance, to orderly carry out the construction of high-quality outdoor sports destinations and ensure the timely achievement of the goal of "building about 100 high-quality outdoor sports destinations by 2030."

On April 7, 2024, the CPC Central Committee and the State Council issued the "Plan to Accelerate the Construction of a Strong Agricultural Country (2024-2035)" and issued a notice requiring all regions and departments to earnestly implement it in light of their actual situations. Many aspects are related to cultural and tourism work.

On April 7, 2024, in order to implement the Party Central Committee and the State Council's decisions and deployments on vigorously developing healthy consumption, in accordance with the relevant work requirements of the "State Council's Opinions on Promoting the High-Quality Development of Service Consumption," to cultivate and develop new productive forces in the field of healthy consumption, improve the quality of the supply of healthy goods and services, and better meet the needs of the people for a better life, the Ministry of Commerce, the National Health Commission, and 12 other departments jointly formulated the "Special Action Plan to Promote Healthy Consumption."

On April 11, 2024, the Ministry of Commerce issued the "Work Plan for Accelerating the Advancement of the Service Industry Expanding Open Comprehensive Pilot Programs," proposing 14 specific tasks for a new round of pilot programs, involving telecommunications services, medical and health care, and commerce, culture, and tourism.

On April 15, 2024, in accordance with the arrangements of the "Notice on Recommending the Second Batch of "Typical Cases of Intangible Cultural Heritage Workshops" issued by the Office of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, the Office of the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, and the Office of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, and the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs organized the recommendation work for the second batch of "Typical Cases of Intangible Cultural Heritage Workshops" (hereinafter referred to as "typical cases"). Based on the active applications from various places, after research, selection, and announcement, 51 typical cases were identified, and the list is now announced.

On April 29, 2024, the Ministry of Civil Affairs, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, and 19 other departments jointly issued the "Guiding Opinions on Supporting the Social Participation of the Elderly and Promoting the Achievement of "Active Aging," which mentions improving the elderly-friendly level of tourism service facilities, encouraging the development of travel and retirement, "family travel," and other services that the elderly enjoy, implementing the replacement of age restrictions with health status, improving industry regulatory mechanisms, and developing elderly tourism insurance business.

On April 30, 2024, the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development jointly issued the "Notice on the Implementation of the 2025 Central Government Fiscal Support for Urban Renewal Actions" (Cai Ban Jian [2025] No. 11), clarifying that this year, the central government will provide a fixed amount of subsidies to no more than 20 cities to support local urban renewal, with the maximum subsidy amount not exceeding 1.2 billion yuan.

On April 30, 2024, in order to implement the rural revitalization strategy and solidly advance the empowerment of rural revitalization by the cultural industry, in accordance with the work arrangements of the "Notice on Carrying Out the Second Batch of Pilot Programs for Cultural Industry Empowering Rural Revitalization" (Ban Chan Ye Han [2024] No. 257) issued by the Office of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, the Office of the Ministry of Education, the Office of the Ministry of Natural Resources, and the Office of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, after application and recommendation, review and selection, and announcement, 50 pilot areas for the second batch of cultural industry empowering rural revitalization were identified (see attachment for details), which are now announced.

On May 19, 2024, the cultural industry standards "General Technical Requirements for Cloud Service Platforms for Internet Service Business Venues" (WH/T 107-2025), "E-sports Hotels E-sports Business Service Requirements" (WH/T 108-2025), the tourism industry standards "Online Information Requirements for Tourist Attractions" (LB/T 093-2025), "Online Tourism Platform Accommodation Booking Service Specifications" (LB/T 094-2025), "Tourism Service Quality Big Data Evaluation Indicators" (LB/T 095-2025), and "Training Guide for Barrier-Free Tourism Personnel" (LB/T 096-2025) have been approved by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism and are now announced.

On May 30, 2024, in order to further strengthen ecological and cultural construction, establish and improve an ecological and cultural system based on the concept of ecological value, promote the research, inheritance, dissemination, promotion, and transformation and utilization of ecological culture, and cultivate the endogenous driving force for ecological civilization construction, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, the China Federation of Literary and Art Circles, and the China Writers Association jointly issued the "Guiding Opinions on Further Strengthening Ecological and Cultural Construction."

On June 9, the State Administration of Cultural Heritage completed the assessment of a new batch of national archaeological site parks, with 10 units included in the list. So far, 65 national archaeological site parks have been assessed, distributed across 21 provinces (autonomous regions and municipalities) nationwide.

On June 10, in accordance with the relevant provisions of the "Management Measures for National Cultural Ecological Protection Zones" (Order No. 1 of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism), the Ministry of Culture and Tourism organized the acceptance work for the construction achievements of national cultural ecological protection experimental zones. After material review, on-site undercover investigations, expert review, and public announcement, the national cultural ecological protection experimental zones that passed the acceptance were officially designated as national cultural ecological protection zones.