Nearly a third of Chinese companies expect their travel budgets to grow over the next year, according to CITS American Express Global Business Travel’s 2017 China Business Travel Survey.
A year ago, only 17 percent of companies said they would increase their budgets, compared to 31 percent this year.
The Belt and Road Initiative, a development strategy to strengthen economic relations across East Asia, Europe, Africa and the Middle East, is responsible for 43 percent of the companies that are expanding their budgets.
The majority of survey respondents, 90 percent, said client-related travel likely would increase revenue.
China has the world’s largest travel expenditure budget, although 75 percent is domestic travel.
“While our research indicates an intent to increase business travel budgets over the next year, when we look deeper we find that the intention to increase spending also comes with some strategic reallocation of expenditure,” Kevin Tan, vice president of CITS American Express Global Business Travel, said. “This is particularly noticeable when considering the number of organizations that have reported plans to reduce spending on internal meetings. It is apparent that businesses continue to acknowledge the importance of client-facing travel.”
CITS American Express Global Business Travel provides businesses with travel services, tools, and insights.