How does this major province in Northeast China manage to achieve further growth on an already high base?

Recently, the General Office of the People's Government of Heilongjiang Province has issued the *Implementation Plan for the "100-Day Action" of Winter Ice and Snow Tourism in Heilongjiang (2026—2027)* (hereinafter referred to as the "Plan"). The Plan specifies that this action will be launched from November 8, 2026 to February 28, 2027, themed "Ice & Snow World · Passionate Heilongjiang", implementing ten major improvement actions, with a focus on building a world-class ice and snow tourism resort and an ice and snow economic highland.

The ten major improvement actions cover tourism products, cultural-tourism integration, tourism catering, tourism accommodation, tourism transportation, cultural-tourism consumption, tourism services, tourism facilities, market supervision, brand marketing and other fields. Among them, in terms of implementing the "Pristine Heilongjiang · Renewed Tour Routes" tourism product improvement action, the Plan proposes to upgrade the classic ice and snow tourism routes led by "one core", build characteristic ice and snow tourism routes at the "top of two poles", cultivate the most beautiful ice and snow tourism corridors with "border customs", and optimize the all-for-one ice and snow tourism routes with "high-quality products of famous cities".

This is the second consecutive year that the General Office of the Provincial Government of Heilongjiang has issued a special implementation plan to set up a complete framework for consumption throughout the entire ice and snow season. The target put forward in the plan is to strive to achieve a year-on-year increase of over 7% in the number of received tourists and over 8% in total tourist consumption on the basis of the high operating baseline.

How high is this "high baseline"? Looking back at the 2024—2025 ice and snow season, the total number of tourists received in Heilongjiang increased by 18.5% year on year, and the total tourist consumption increased by 30.7% year on year; for the 2025—2026 ice and snow season, the growth targets for the number of received tourists and total tourist consumption were set at over 10% and 15% respectively, and the final actual growth reached 10.4% in total tourist arrivals and 15.1% in total tourist spending.

To achieve the sustained growth target in the new season, the plan lists upgrading the classic ice and snow tourism routes led by "one core" as the top priority of the tourism product improvement action, aiming to enhance the influence of Harbin as an "outstanding global ice and snow tourism city", and innovate and upgrade brand events including the 28th Harbin Ice and Snow World.

Outside Harbin, Heilongjiang is also guiding all regions to leverage their own advantages to achieve differentiated development, to fully tap the resources of the two poles of "China's Arctic" Mohe and "China's Eastern Pole" Fuyuan, and connect the air routes of "Harbin - Mohe - Heihe - Yichun - Fuyuan"; integrate characteristic resources in border areas, and launch border ice and snow self-driving travel products, etc.

In addition, Heilongjiang also mentioned that it will deepen the integration model of "culture-tourism + all industries" and "all industries + culture-tourism", and promote the in-depth integration of agriculture, sports, culture, tourism and commerce. This includes continuously enhancing the influence of brands such as "High-Quality Heilongjiang Black Soil Products" and "Nine Treasures & Eighteen Specialties", developing a series of "Heilongjiang Souvenirs" and local characteristic cultural and creative products, and promoting characteristic Heilongjiang commodities to enter key scenic spots.

In fact, the ice and snow industrial chain has extended to the real economy, and sectors outside the cultural and tourism industry such as ice and snow equipment manufacturing and cold region testing are taking shape. According to statistics, in Harbin alone, 36 key ice and snow equipment enterprises achieved a total main business revenue of 240 million yuan in 2025, representing a year-on-year increase of 29.4%.

In accordance with the *Several Opinions on Stimulating the Vitality of the Ice and Snow Economy through High-Quality Development of Ice and Snow Sports* issued by the General Office of the State Council, the total scale of the ice and snow economy will reach 1.2 trillion yuan by 2027 and 1.5 trillion yuan by 2030. When building a northern ice and snow economy leading zone with international influence, the regions designated for this mission include not only Heilongjiang, but also Inner Mongolia, Liaoning, Jilin and Xinjiang.

This year, Xinjiang took the lead in launching actions. On October 20, the Koktokay International Ski Resort opened for the new ski season first, nearly three weeks earlier than mainstream ski resorts in Northeast China; data from Tongcheng Travel shows that the search popularity for skiing in Xinjiang ranked first nationwide in that week, and the "first ski of the snow season" drove the search popularity of routes to Altay to surge 11 times month on month.

Winter tourism in Inner Mongolia has also been launched. Relying on core IPs including the Joyful Ice and Snow Season, Ice and Snow Nadam, China's Cold Pole, and Winter of the Greater Khingan Range, it has released more than 300 winter characteristic ice and snow activities to the public, and launched 36 high-quality winter tourism routes to enrich the supply of winter tourism products across the region.

The "new competition season" has kicked off, and more incremental market share is up for grabs.

This article is from the WeChat Official Account "City Evolution Theory", written by Yang Huan, and published with authorization from 36Kr.