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In China by the end of 2008, there were over 300 courses open across the country, nearly half of them located in the southern Guangdong Province (responsible for over a third of tourism arrivals to China), and the country’s two major cities of Shanghai and Beijing (KPMG, 2008b). The development of the leisure and tourism industry has led to an increase in golf tourism in the country, and media exposure from hosting world-class golf tournaments (including the World Cup of Golf) has fuelled interest from overseas markets. China’s most successful golf resorts include Shenzhen’s Mission Hills (see ‘Snapshot’ below), Shanghai’s Sheshan International, Beijing’s Pine Valley, and Kunming’s Spring City. These are comparable to some of the best golf resorts in the world, and the trend for high-quality golfing complexes is likely to continue as developers respond to the demand from the growing middle and upper classes for top-quality housing and living environments.
Another emerging destination for golf tourists in India. Although golf tourism is only just beginning to be promoted there, a modest number of golf tourists are arriving from Japan and Korea. According to the Indian Golf Union, there are 186 golf courses and approximately 100,000 golf club members in the country (KPMG, 2008c). Courses in India are not usually part of a residential community or an integrated component of a tourist resort, but this is changing. Residential dwellings built around a golf course are the latest trend in the Indian realty sector. For example, in 2007, Royal Indian Raj International Corporation, a foreign investment company in the Indian real estate sector based in Vancouver, announced a partnership with Jack Nicklaus to build as many as eight 18-hole courses as multimillion-dollar centerpieces to the firm’s new resort and residential communities across India (Kumar, 2007). The growing number of international golf events hosted in India and the increasing success of professional Indian golfers on international circuits, will, like in China, lead to more positive exposure for the sport, and continued growth in golf tourism in the country.