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Arid Land Geography ›› 2025, Vol. 48 ›› Issue (9): 1660-1671.doi: 10.12118/j.issn.1000-6060.2024.103

• Regional Development • Previous Articles     Next Articles

Measurement and spatial pattern characteristics of tourism high-quality development level of urbans in the Yellow River Basin

TIAN Xiaobo1,2()   

  1. 1. Tourism College, Lanzhou University of Arts and Science, Lanzhou 730010, Gansu, China
    2. Institute for High-Quality Development of Culture and Tourism Industry, Lanzhou University of Arts and Science, Lanzhou 730010, Gansu, China
  • Received:2024-02-21 Revised:2024-05-27 Online:2025-09-25 Published:2025-09-17

Abstract:

The high-quality development of tourism is the core theme of China’s tourism development during the current period and the longer-term future. Thus, an accurate grasp of the connotation and characteristics of high-quality development of tourism and scientific measurement of the high-quality development level of tourism must form the basis for the exploration of its development path. Drawing on the essential attributes of tourism and the new development concept, this paper constructs an evaluation index system for the high-quality development of tourism and uses the entropy value method and exploratory spatial analysis to measure the high-quality development of tourism and the characteristics of spatial patterns in the Yellow River Basin that were prevailing in 2019. The study shows the following results: (1) In terms of subdimensions, the overall level of high-quality development of the tourism industry in the Yellow River Basin is low, with the proportion of high-value zones ranging from 11% to 40%, the proportion of low-value zones ranging from 30% to 72%, and the proportion of high-value zones in the subdimensions of smoothness-efficient, fairness-shared, and innovation-driven being less than 10%. In terms of comprehensiveness, the high-quality level of development of the tourism industry in the cities of the Yellow River Basin is relatively low, with a low to medium level accounting for 71.67% and a high-value area of 28.33%. (2) There are significant features of spatial differentiation in both the subdimension and the composite dimension. In the composite dimension, the high-quality development level of the tourism industry as a whole decreases from the downstream to the upstream gradient; in the subdimension, the stable and efficient levels are high in the west, low in the middle, and medium in the east; the levels of green and sustainable are high upstream, medium in the middle, and low downstream and, finally, the trend of the differentiation across the remaining dimensions is the same as those of the composite dimension. (3) There is a significant spatial dependence effect in the dimensions stable and efficient, green and sustainable, coordinated development, culture and tourism integration, and comprehensive. The spatial agglomeration characteristics of the subdimension and the comprehensive dimension differ. However, all characteristics exhibit spatial polarization featuring high- and low-value differentiated agglomeration.

Key words: high-quality development of tourism, measurement, spatial pattern, Yellow River Basin