Massive New Year passenger flow indicates Chinese presence in Tibet

(TibetanReview.net, Jan31 2010)  The Tibet Autonomous Region will handle 850,000 passengers during the Spring Festival (the Chinese New Year) travel rush, which began in late Jan and end in early Mar, reported China’s official Xinhuanet news service Jan 29, citing the Tibet Autonomous Regional Transportation Administration. Although the report did not give any breakdown figures, it does give an indication of a general idea about the number of Chinese working and earning their living in occupied Tibet.

The report said that of them, 650,000, or 80 percent, would travel by bus, which is suggestive of the fact that most of them are migrant Chinese workers or petty entrepreneurs in non-managerial and non-high tech skill pursuits.

The figures seem to include people traveling both in and out of TAR, which would include Tibetans as well, since the spring Festival and Losar (Tibetan New Year) both fall on Feb 14 this time. However, given their mobility and extremely low urbanization rate, the share of Tibetans in the total number of passengers is likely to be very small.