China introduces new school holiday to get parents spending more

Until 2025, only a handful of cities in China allowed schools to go on a break each autumn.

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But in recent months, at least 27 others have joined the list, with more possibly on the way.From the eastern Zhejiang province to Sichuan in the southwest, officials are carving out days off in the hope that families use the chance to splurge on travel - or at least dispatch their children on school-organised trips.

By freeing up time away from classes, the authorities are pulling on a new lever in their quest to get households to spend more, and at little cost to cash-strapped local budgets.

And if the southern Chinese city of Foshan is any indication, China may not have to wait long for the payoff.

After Foshan introduced a three-day school holiday in November, calls to Guangzhou Comfort International Travel Co came pouring in from families suddenly searching for an activity to occupy the time.

Business was so brisk that the staff had to work overtime and breaks were slashed in half, stretching the Foshan branch's resources to the point where it had to ask the travel agency's Guangzhou headquarters for extra hands.

"We were indeed a bit flustered when we had to handle the policy of autumn breaks for the first time," said Mr Zheng Zihua, who works at the agency. "Our business was even hotter than the November before the pandemic."

The number of travellers from Foshan surged more than 50 per cent during the autumn break from a year ago, its data showed, of which more than three-quarters were families.

The latest change followed Beijing's repeated calls on localities to adopt spring and autumn school holidays to "improve the environment for consumption". Under China's current education system, students in primary, middle and high schools only get two holidays a year, in summer and winter.