China’s factory floors have turned out to be sought after destinations during summer vacation this year. There has been a visible rise in tours to hi-tech manufacturing facilities like electric vehicles, electronics, and high-speed trains, with shipyards and breweries also in the mix. According to a popular Chinese online travel booking platform, Tongcheng, bookings for factory tours rose more than 36 per cent year-on-year during this summer season, with families accounting for 68 per cent of bookings.

A growing phenomenon

These factory-technology tours are part of the growing phenomenon of industrial tourism (gongye luyou) – a policy initiative actively promoted by the ruling Communist Party-state. Rather than make these tours from a sightseeing perspective, The state seeks to make them niche tourism an instrument for showcasing industrial capability, strengthening industrial brands, and educating young people about technology. According to Beijing city’s municipal bureau, in 2024, the city had 15 million industrial tourists and generated 1.7 billion yuan ($248 million) in revenue.

The origins of China’s industrial tourism dates back to the 1990s when industrial enterprises like breweries, dairy farms and petrochemicals sought to use tourism for building better consumer relationships. The central government built on the local experiments to standardise locations, and in 2004, officially designated 306 sites across China under the national industrial and agricultural tourism rubric. It marked the formalisation of the phenomenon of industrial tourism. In addition, the Communist Party of China has also emphasised on preserving industrial heritage sites, especially in the revolutionary base areas during their conflict with Japanese forces as well as the Kuomintang in the civil war before the establishment of the People’s Republic in 1949. This convergence of revolutionary and industrial heritage provides the foundation for the promotion of industrial tourism in advanced technology sectors over the last decade. Presently, China has 264 designated national industrial heritage sites.

In May this year, a joint document issued by seven departments including the Ministry of Tourism, Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and Ministry of Education, explicitly called for expanding the supply of industrial tourism products, promoting more factory tours, activating industrial museums, and turning more manufacturing facilities into tourist destinations. This cross-departmental policy makes promotion of industrial tourism systematic and widens the scope into areas such as aerospace, robotics, e-commerce, and logistics, where China has been expanding its capabilities. The policy integrates industrial heritage, cultural tourism, innovation, education and consumption. Local governments too have joined in, crafting policies suited to their jurisdictions. For instance, the city of Beijing has made plans to integrate its tech hubs into tourism routes to open up robotics factories and autonomous vehicle labs for public viewing.

An eye on the future

While the main intention of these tours is to showcase innovation and manufacturing prowess to instil national pride, attention has also been given to the future. The tours are platforms to spark interest in STEM as a sustainable career option among the youth and facilitate the creation of a future generations of engineers and technology professionals. The growing participation of urban middle-class families in these tours attests to this point. Universities across China have been expanding the number of programmes and enrolments in Artificial Intelligence, robotics, semiconductors and other related engineering fields, which has also been underlined in the 15th Five-Year Plan.

By combining tours with research and consumption, companies are able to promote their brands while creating new revenue streams. For example, the tours of Xiaomi’s facilities are in high demand, with slots highly priced and allotted through lottery. In an intensively competitive domestic market, the factory tours help companies connect better with consumers. From testing new products to visiting a showroom, and having meals in company’s cafeteria, the immersive experience builds stronger emotional connection with the brands. Apart from the domestic footfalls, foreign investors, executives and technology professionals are participating in such tours, to observe China’s economic and industrial transformation.

A lesson for India

India may not be at the same scale as China in terms of industrial manufacturing and advanced facilities. However, there is space to experiment and diversify the country’s tourism experience to include firms in both public and private sectors. While industrial visits and internships for students are part of technical, engineering curricula, it would be worthwhile to make large-scale factories and production facilities open to public visits.

While the Indian government prioritises the ‘Make in India’ initiative to boost the country’s manufacturing ambitions, it could select some industrial hubs for tourism and promote them under ‘Learn in India’. Building industrial tourism circuits in States with higher number of manufacturing zones – like Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra and Gujarat – is another idea worth experimenting. All of this require Inter-ministerial coordination and joint initiatives.

The major takeaway from the Chinese experience is the need for holistic integration of state, industry, and higher education to achieve development objectives.

(Anand P. Krishnan is a Fellow at the Centre of Excellence for Himalayan Studies, Shiv Nadar Institution of Eminence, Delhi NCR)

India’s latest industrial growth figures show that, contrary to global trends and overall perception, the country’s industrial output is getting stronger. Notably, the data show a quick bounce-back in industrial performance after the initial hit from the West Asia crisis. However, the new data also raise some important concerns about the composition of the growth, the systems behind the recent data upgrades, and the need for further improvements. Growth in the Index of Industrial Production hit a five-month high of 5.1% in May 2026, up from the 4.9% growth seen in April, which itself was a substantial improvement over the performance in March — the first full month after the West Asia crisis began. Within this, the manufacturing sector grew at a relatively robust 5.5% in May, albeit slower than in April. One view is that this is due to a revival in domestic consumption, since the consumer durables and non-durables sectors also grew at multi-month highs. Consumer durables, especially, have done well in April and May. However, the contrary argument is that domestic demand is in fact not doing well, and it is export growth that is leading to higher production. This is bolstered by the fact that GST revenues from domestic transactions have grown slower over the last six months than in 2025-26 and the year before that. Merchandise exports, on the other hand, hit a four-year high in April followed by an all-time high in May. It would certainly be welcome if India’s industry has global demand to fill, but the fact that more of this demand is not coming from within the country is a cause for concern. The economy is already hostage to world events.

The May IIP data were also accompanied by a note from the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MoSPI) stating that it had made a major change to the methodology for computing growth for some sectors. It had abandoned the Wholesale Price Index as its chosen deflator to estimate the value of production in favour of the new Producer Price Index. This is a more accurate approach. But it did not, however, answer why this change was implemented belatedly and not when the new series of data was introduced on June 1. It suggests an unusually unsystematic approach by MoSPI. The strong growth in the IIP also does not reconcile with the fact that the Index of Eight Core Sectors — a separate government measure of industrial growth — grew at its second-lowest rate in 21 months in May. The core sector index is still outdated while the other major indices have been recently updated, but such a discrepancy nevertheless raises questions about what exactly is being measured.

India’s relatively strong industrial performance in November 2025, especially driven by the manufacturing sector as it was, was more likely a flash in the pan than the start of a consistent trend. The Index of Industrial Production (IIP) grew 6.7% in November, the fastest growth rate in 25 months. Within this, the manufacturing sector grew 8%, which also was the fastest in 25 months. On the face of it, this would look remarkable and heartening, especially since October 2025 had seen growth slow to a 14-month low. However, this surge in growth was more likely due to seasonal and one-off factors. According to economists, the strongest push for growth came from sellers re-stocking their supplies following the festive season. The second factor is that the government timed the Goods and Services Tax (GST) rate reductions to coincide with the festive season. This temporary bump in demand would have further eroded stock levels, which then need to be replenished. In fact, the consumer durables and non-durables sectors saw growth in November rebounding to 10.3% and 7.3%, a 12-month and 25-month high, respectively. The third factor that seems to have worked in November is the bounce back of the mining sector following two months of contractions due to an unseasonably long monsoon. The mining sector saw growth come in at a reasonably strong 5.4% in November 2025. All of these are legitimate reasons for growth to pick up, but are not sustainable ones. The electricity and mining sectors will be bound by the vagaries of the weather. Overall consumer demand has been sluggish and industry players are talking of the GST-related boost already ebbing. And the festive season will not come back around until October-November 2026.

In fact, the IIP grew just 3.3% in the longer April-November period, the lowest for these eight months in any of the post-COVID-19 pandemic years. The consumer non-durables sector contracted 1% during this period, showing that the boost in November is not indicative. That the strong growth in November is more an anomaly than a sign of things to come should not come as a surprise. The Reserve Bank of India, earlier this month, predicted that growth in Q3 would slow to 7% from an average of 8% in the first two quarters. The fourth quarter is predicted to slow even further, to 6.5%. All of the previous headwinds still exist. The 50% tariffs by the U.S. are still in place, private investment remains sluggish, foreign capital is pulling out of the country, the weakening rupee is making imports more expensive for an import-dependent economy, real wages are not growing fast enough, and consumer demand remains tepid. Ironically, November’s positive industrial data bring into focus the headwinds the economy is really facing.

The Government has set up a committee to examine the tax and export clearance issues being faced by manufacturing units and suggest measures to further streamline the system amid high tariffs imposed by the U.S., an official has said.

The Committee includes representatives from the Finance Ministry, Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT), Department of Commerce, Directorate General of Foreign Trade (DGFT), and the RBI.

It also has special invitees from industry chambers, Federation of Indian Export Organisations, export promotion councils, and consultancy firms.

The official said the Committee will examine the existing export-related tax structures (both customs duties and export incentives) and export clearance procedures to identify their impact on the manufacturing sectors’ competitiveness and export performance, and suggest refinements or alternatives, if needed.

Besides, it would identify sector-specific challenges in high-potential export sectors, such as engineering, pharmaceuticals, electronics, chemicals, agro and processed food, textiles, leather, gems and jewellery.

It would also study and recommend global best practices in export taxation and customs facilitation, and propose actionable policy reforms to streamline processes.

The Committee is expected to submit its report in two months.

Indian manufacturing sectors are facing issues because of the imposition of a steep 50% tariff on Indian goods entering America from August 27.

The high duty will make India’s labour-intensive goods less competitive in the US market compared to those from Vietnam, Bangladesh, and Thailand, which face lower tariffs.

The U.S. accounted for about 20% ($86.5 billion) of the country’s total goods exports of $437 billion in 2024-25.