The 'chunyun': the largest annual migration on the planet becomes an economic thermometer for China

It's Wednesday at noon. In Beijing, the subway line 7, which runs through the center-south of the city from east to west, is busier than on other days at this same time. Many passengers are loaded with suitcases and other belongings and, by the time they reach the end of the journey, the Western Train Station, there is no room for anything. Dozens of people and numerous children run towards the main entrance. One of them is Guo (pseudonym), a man who is over 50 years old and is dressed in a ushanka, the Russian-style hat with which you cover yourself from the cold; He has the tanned complexion typical of the working class and carries a black backpack, almost half his size, and a gigantic suitcase. She avoids giving his real name, but details that he returns to Baotou, his hometown in the northern province of Inner Mongolia. It is the first time in four years that he will celebrate the New Year of the lunar calendar with his family, although, he assures, he has been able to visit them more than once throughout this time. “Last year it was very dangerous to go back [durante las fiestas]. There were many infections in the big cities and I didn't want to risk it,” she says with a strong accent.

Like Guo, millions of migrant workers return to their origins during the 40 days of chunyun, the travel season for the Spring Festival (Chinese New Year). It is considered the largest annual human migration on the planet and, for the Year of the Dragon, which begins on February 10, authorities plan to break all records. Between January 26 and March 6, 9 billion trips will be made, according to the Ministry of Transport. The figure triples the 2.98 billion trips in 2019, before the pandemic. Last year, when China was facing its worst wave of covid, 1,595 million were counted, the highest figure in three calendars. The exponential increase in forecasts is due to the fact that the statistics now include “the volume of passenger cars by road, both on national and provincial highways,” according to Beijing.

He chunyun It is, mainly, a mass movement back home of those who live outside it, although it can also involve days of rest and tourism. As if summer and Christmas came together, children have a month of vacation, university students see their parents again and millions of workers who reside in other provinces close up shop and head towards their roots. For many, it will be the only time all year that they will be able to combine eight consecutive holidays. The country has almost 300 million rural migrants, of the 1,412 million Chinese, and it is estimated that around a third of the residents of Beijing, of 22 million inhabitants, are technically migrant workers (they do not have the hukou of the capital, China's population census system, linked to a person's origin).

The travel frenzy, in a certain way, can be taken as a thermometer of the economy, employment and consumption: if there is movement it means that people are working, have money and want to return home. Although Chinese finances have recovered from the ravages of the pandemic (GDP advanced 5.2% in 2023), the ghosts of a recession in the real estate market have undermined the confidence of households, which have not finished spending as expected. expected after reopening. This week, the Hong Kong justice system decreed the liquidation of Evergrande, which was the largest housing developer in China, now the most indebted in the world.

Expectations for the holidays are high in any case. In 2023, the restaurant and hospitality sector soared by 14.5% compared to the previous year, one of the largest increases in recent decades, although much of it was due to the very low statistical base of the still dull and pandemic 2022 But there are positive indicators. Compared to 2019, Air China has opened 32% more air routes, and hotel and group travel bookings through the Fliggy agency have soared by 160% and 34%, respectively. The Ministry of Transport expects 480 million trips by train, 80 million by plane and 7.2 billion by car. Only on the first day of chunyun 189 million trips were made throughout the nation, 19.7% more than in 2023, reports the official Xinhua news agency.

At the West Station, the lines move quickly in time with the instructions of the security guards. At the door, a man from Shaanxi guards his and another couple's travel bags. “We are trying to get a ticket. We hope someone cancels and we can travel today,” he says. “This year there are more people and it is more difficult,” he adds. Liu Qing, 37, a teacher living in the capital, writes via WeChat that she will travel on New Year's Eve because it has been impossible for her to get a ticket before that date to return to her city, Taiyuan. . It is expected that most officials and company employees will travel on that day.

Many of the trips have to do with school holidays and the eternal dilemma of working parents: what to do with the children. Bai Jie, a 36-year-old doctor, has just arrived in Sanya with her daughter, who is currently running around the beach of this tourist city in Hainan, a tropical island in the South China Sea. She will leave her for several weeks in the care of her grandparents, now retired, who bought an apartment by the sea 10 years ago, and used to spend the winter months here, until Covid arrived. “It is the first year that we returned after the pandemic,” says the family in the shade of some palm trees. Bai Jie will soon return to the cold province of Shanxi, where she lives on her own, because she has to continue working, just like her husband.

Many take advantage of the chunyun to take a few days of rest. “Working all the time makes you sad,” says Xia Jian, 41, a guy who spent six years working in Africa and, in 2023, after the post-pandemic reopening, opened a restaurant in Henan province. He smokes a cigarette sitting on a blanket on the sand. Behind him, boats drag giant duck-shaped floats. He likes the place, he goes for walks, rides a jet ski. He has good feelings about the economy: “The money is there. The question is whether one is willing to spend it.” There is beach hustle and bustle all around him. But Ding Daquan, a 74-year-old retiree who also has an apartment facing the sea, assures that there are still “much fewer people” than before the health crisis.

Vincent Chan, China strategist at Aletheia Capital, a Hong Kong-based financial firm, is quite convinced that this year will be “good” in terms of tourism. Especially compared to the past, when restrictions had already been lifted, but infections spread throughout the country. Travel, in any case, does not entirely indicate an improvement in confidence in the economy. “The big question is about other types of consumption, like buying cars,” he says. Vehicles are a big piece of the retail sales pie. “They are a different decision than buying a plane ticket,” he adds. “Buying a car is (an act of) large-scale discretionary consumption.” And, at the moment, car sales “are not that strong.” In 2024, he concludes, we will have to be attentive to whether the Chinese economy shows “genuine signs” that it has hit bottom and is beginning to recover, particularly in areas linked to “domestic confidence”, such as large-scale consumption and the battered market. real estate.

For now, concerns about the brick crisis seem to have taken a backseat among Chinese travelers. Huang Ning, a 27-year-old Beijing native, plans to break away from family commitments as soon as possible to go surfing in the Philippines during the week-long vacation. On Wednesday, at the
capital's station, four students from Xinjiang University said that they had spent a few days visiting Beijing. “It is the first time since we started our degree that we have been able to take a trip with friends, and we wanted to take advantage of it while our parents are working. Now we are separated until we resume classes in mid-February,” explains one of them, before leaving for her native Wuhan.

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