Research On Tourism Industry Convergence Mechanism And Convergence Level

With improvement of national people’s living standards and cultural level of education, people’s consumption concept has undergone great changes, tourists are no longer satisfied with the pursuit of a conventional material, and begin to pursue spirit enjoyment and life of high quality, such new concept has influenced their choice of tourism products. As improvement of personal incomes, increasement of leisure time and accumulation of travel experiences for tourists, travel demand of pepole has gradually shifted to a resort as well as the depth of experience from the previous leisure sightseeing, which has higher requests for the development of China’s tourism industry. While the integration of industry is an important approach of the production of personalized products for tourism corporate, and main channel of enriching tourism product system as well as optimizing structure of tourism product, it has been an important manifestation of connotating development road for tourism industry of China. To adapt such development trend, tourism industry convergence has become attention focus between tourism innovative practice and tourism theoretical research. Throughout existing academia research results, their research focuses are primarily on the definition, type, cause, effect, pattern, path, existing problem and development strategy in the field of tourism industry convergence, particularly applied research accounts for most percents of research achievement, mainly for integration research between tourism industry and some industry, less theoretical research for exploring the internal laws of tourism industry, more less explotation on evolution process from low level to advanced level on tourism industry convergence, and mechanism of achieving tourism industry convergence as well as convergence level of tourism industry. Therefore, this thesis just begins to carry out base on such research current situation.The paper gives full play complementary advantages of among theories which are relevant to this subject, so the paper utilizes synthesizely systems theory, self-organization theory, innovation theory and evolutionary economic theory. On the basis of comprehensive review main research results in the field of tourism industry convergence, the thesis illustrates systematically connotation of tourism industry convergence, then analyzes evolution process of tourism industry convergence from two aspects between tourism enterprise and tourism industry, followingly it builds conceptual model for tourism industry convergence mechanism, which discuss conditions of realizing tourism industry convergence from three aspects including incentive mechanism, dynamic mechanism and safeguard mechanism. On the basis of summary and evaluation for major calculation methods of industry convergence, the thesis finds that Herfindahl-Hirschman Index is the best calculation way in the company level. According to calculating convergence level of tourism industry for thirty tourism listed companies in mainland of China, thus points out those tourism enterprises which have obvious merged performance. On the basis of it, the paper analyzes convergence level of tourism industry for five tourism enterprises. Afterwards, the paper analyzes convergence condition for tourism industry for China from four levels including society, technology, finance and policy aspects. Finally, the thesis puts forward countermeasures and suggestions on convergence development of tourism industry in the future from seven points. Main conclusions of this study are as follows.Firstly, based on the evolution economic theory, the paper puts forward tourism industry convergence refers to the process that tourism enterprises re-search and create new practices when previous practices by inherited genetic mechanisms can not bring them satisfactory profits, after a series of learning as well as trials and errors, they take targeted industry convergence as a major path of tourism product innovation, through action of market selection mechanism, then it leads to peer imitation and follow, eventually this product spreads to the whole tourism industry. Main bodies of tourism industry convergence are those tourism enterprises which engaged in the integration of tourism products and services. Object of tourism industry convergence refers to specific object by main bodies of tourism industry convergence. Broadly speaking, the object includes new tourism products and tourism types possessing common features of integrated industries. In a narrow sense, the object is tourism product bearing common features of integrated industries.Secondly, tourism industry is generated by interaction of among tourism enterprises, while tourism industry convergence is formed by interaction between tourism enterprise and other related industries enterprise, micro-integration of tourism enterprise can give rise to macro-integration of tourism industry through positive interaction among enterprises. As living condition and selection condition of tourism enterprises, industry integration also shapes the evolution trajectory of tourism enterprises. Since tourism industry convergence is achieved through tourism enterprises takes cross-industry convergence, then behavior actors of tourism industry convergence are those tourism enterprises engaged in tourism product possessing common features of integrated industries. Therefore, analysis of evolution process on tourism industry convergence must start from convergence conduct of tourism enterprises.Thirdly, the thesis finds that there are some differences in each stage on tourism industry convergence level by analyzing tourism industry innovation capability of three stages including germination period, growth period and maturity period of tourism industry, and industry convergence level increases gradually. In germination period, innovation is very limited for tourism industry; there is rare cross-penetration between tourism industry and related industries, tourism industry convergence depends greatly on traditional tourism resources, which leads to low convergence level, so it has more obvious boundaries between tourism industry and other related industry. In growth period, innovation capacity of tourism industry starts to improve a lot, there is more cross-penetration between tourism industry and related industries, so boundaries between tourism industry and other related industry blur gradually, which means degree of tourism industry improves steadily. In maturity period, cross-penetration between tourism industry and related industries is very frequent; cross-industry integration has become general innovation, boundary of tourism industry is very blurred, the tourism industry begins to enter stage of deep integration development.Fourthly, incentive mechanism, dynamic mechanism and guarantee mechanism consists conditions of achieving tourism industry convergence. Among them, the incentive mechanism of tourism industry includes endogenous needs and external demands. The role of creative thoughts, progress of modern science and technology as well as role of modular division constitutes external incentives for tourism industry convergence; while needs of live together, maintains and enhances comparative advantages, frequency-dependent effects as well as network effects constitute endogenous incentives for tourism industry convergence. Competition and cooperation constitute dynamic mechanism of tourism industry convergence; technological innovation and institutional innovation have become safeguard mechanism for tourism industry convergence. Through technical innovation and institutional innovation together, the tourism industry begins to develop cross-industry integration, by means of making use of resource of other industries, which expands constantly the range of tourism resources, development space of tourism industry continues to enlarge, generating more new tourism types and new tourism products, to some extent, it promotes transformation and upgrading of the tourism industry, which makes convergence level of tourism industry evolve ceaselessly from low level to advanced level.Fifthly, industry convergence is above moderate level among those best tourism enterprises, while tourism product structure has a direct impact on integration level of the tourism industry. In terms of effectiveness of cross-border integration development for tourism enterprises, compared to other tourism enterprises, their convergence level is relatively high for Zhangjiajie, Huangshan Tourism, Yunnan Tourism, ECYTS, Hong Kong China Travel Service, Emei Shan and Jinling Hotel companies. Therefore, these companies can delegate highest level of integration development of tourism industry to a considerable extent for China. The thesis takes Zhangjiajie, Huangshan Tourism, Yunnan Tourism, CYTS and Jinling Hotel as representatives among tourism enterprises. It finds the relationship between structure of tourism products and convergence degree of tourism industry through analyzing operation foundation of hoisting convergence degree of tourism industry and convergence degree of the past three years as well as making comparative analysis on convergence degree of tourism industry for the five typical tourist enterprises. Based on the corporate level, the paper points out that the tourism industry must enhance convergence degree by dislocation select target industries according to theirselves own actual condition instead of blind cross-border integration, effectively enhance convergence degree of tourism industry mainly depends on dislocation innovation of tourism products from all types of tourism enterprisesSixthly, in addition to tourism enterprises owning innovation ability for tourism industry convergence, the external condition also has a close relationship to it, the thesis discovers that convergence condition of tourism industry for China has become increasingly mature. By building STEP analysis method, the paper conducts a comprehensive analysis of condition including society, technology, economy, and policy which have impact on tourism industry convergence for China, thus it finds that we have a good foundation in terms of our vacation system and personnel training, vacation system has beening improved, training quality and training scale of tourism personnel go hand in hand. And IT and showcasing technology have being constant mature, which they has been widely used in tourism industry convergence practice of China. Per-capita incomes of our urban and rural as well as three major tourism markets have made great progress. In addition, the state has issued more than 20 tourism industrial policies and tourism development plans related to tourism industry convergence.Finaly, besides intensifying industry convergence between tourism and IT, this paper puts forward countermeasures and suggestions on tourism industry convergence for China from seven aspects; (1)actively improves the policy condition of convergence development of tourism industry; (2)further encourages integration between technology innovation and tourism industry; (3)takes the initiative to promote some tourism enterprises turn into large tourism group; (4)goes into overdrive marketing efforts in order to guide consumption direction; (5)makes system of IPR for tourism product sound; (6)quickens accurate convergence of tourism industry to make valid supply of tourism product come true; (7)reforms tourism personnel education system to foster compound tourism personnel.Through above study, the thesis not only makes up for the lack of existing research results academia to a certain extent, but it responds to the policy call of the state on promoting our tourism industry integrated develop, and goes with the stream of innovation development of tourism industry, which may help to play further integrated functions of tourism industry for China, and make tourism industry achieve tourism industry convergence in a larger space, a wider range and deeper level. For some poverty-stricken areas where have conditions of developing tourism industry, it is beneficial to achieve goals of tourism poverty alleviation. It is desirable to have a certain reference value for guiding development planning, making industry policy, innovating pratice of our tourism industry and promoting tourism reformation of concentrating on supply in "Thirteenth Five Year" period.