Dennis Chang
Division President, China
Mastercard
Q: Is your business / organization affected by the recent outbreak of coronavirus? To what extent?
A: Mastercard is closely monitoring the coronavirus (COVID-19) situation to ensure we are taking all necessary steps to protect our employees and maintain service to our customers. Today, our operations continue as normal, supported by a resilient core infrastructure and comprehensive business continuity plans.In addition, Mastercard has launched the ‘Here for China’ campaign to make donations for epidemic prevention and control. On March 10, The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Wellcome, and Mastercard committed up to USD 125 million in seed funding to speedup the response to the COVID-19 epidemic by identifying, assessing, developing, and scaling-up treatments.
Q: According to your optimistic estimate, how long will it take for tourism to fully recover from the negative impact of the outbreak?
A: Mastercard’s Global Destination Cities Index report indicates that Chinese mainland remains the number one origin market in the Asia-Pacific region and number two worldwide for overseas tourism. We believe that the market scale of China’s tourism brings the industry enough resilience to overcome current difficulties and lead to a quick recovery.
Q: What do you think is a key point that our industry must pay attention to when it recovers from the crisis?
A: Notably, the latest release of the Mastercard Caixin BBD China New Economy Index in February shows that the Chinese new economy can manifest considerable resilience and strong recovery against the epidemic outbreak. The culture and entertainment industry that tourism belongs to ranks top 10 in terms of industry contribution to the index. We shall not only be confident in the industry’s rapid recovery but also recognize tourism as a key enabler to lead the new economy – and even the national economy – through the darkness brought by the disease.
Q: What change (positive or negative) do you think the outbreak may eventually bring to the tourism industry in the future?
A: Contactless payment has played an impressive role during the outbreak and I believe it will emerge as a strong trend that will lead the industry’s digitalization. Meanwhile, China is now responding to the epidemic by further digitalizing its economy, with more than 10 province-level districts launching and accumulating over RMB 25 trillion in investment on ‘new infrastructure’, which focuses on cutting edge areas including 5G, new energy, big data, AI and industrial internet, bringing more digital possibilities to tourism industry.