Remnants of military conflict surround Zhang Zhong Jie’s cafe.
The cafe is located inside an abandoned military fortification, with its entrance surrounded by rusting tanks.
It’s a scene citizens of Taiwan’s remote Kinmen Island know well. All that separates the cafe from mainland China is 6 miles of choppy water and a series of anti-trespass spikes along the beach.
Despite long-standing tensions between Taiwan and China, mainland tourists have been the cafe’s main source of revenue since it opened in 2018.
“In the beginning, we had regular group tourists — maybe at least two or three buses from travel agencies every day,” Zhang said.
But five years later, things look very different.
A row of anti-intrusion spikes line a beach in Kinmen, with mainland China in the distance.
Source: Jan Camenzind Broomby
Although China claims sovereignty over Taiwan, Chinese tourists have been prevented from visiting Taiwan for years.
In August 2019, Beijing barred individual travelers from visiting Taiwan, citing poor cross-strait relations. In 2020, tour groups were banned from visiting due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
For many in Kinmen, the lack of Chinese visitors has been devastating.
“We haven’t had tourists on the mainland for years,” Zhang said. “The tourism industry in Kinmen has long been heavily dependent on Chinese tourists, so the impact is certainly significant.”
From tanks to tourism
In the mid-20th century, Kinmen was at the forefront of China’s conflict with Taiwan.
Soldiers trained on its beaches, cities were filled with anti-communist propaganda and bomb shelters were hidden in gardens.
Shops that have not opened line the streets of Kinmen.
Source: Jan Camenzind Broomby
But as the military presence on Kinmen receded, the island turned to tourism.
Residents were not deterred by the island’s conflict-ridden past. Like Zhang, many opened cafes in former military fortifications, sold “war rations” in restaurants or made special “bomber knives” from old Chinese artillery shells.
A short boat ride
Kinmen is about 1.8 miles from China, according to the Kinmen County government — but more than 110 miles from mainland Taiwan.
As a result, “businesses in Kinmen in general depend heavily on…links with mainland China,” said local tour guide Chen Hua Sheng. Half-hour boat rides connecting the island to China are running again, but have been mostly filled with Taiwanese passengers, as Chinese travelers were not allowed to visit Kinmen.
With the end of Covid, many hoped that these boats would carry Chinese visitors back to Kinmen once again.
But on February 14, two Chinese citizens were killed when a Taiwanese coast guard vessel and a Chinese vessel collided, causing tensions to escalate.
Chinese tourists are now traveling to some of Taiwan’s outlying islands, but the return of travelers to Kinmen has been slow. Data from the Taiwan Affairs Council show that the number of Chinese nationals who entered Kinmen by boat fell from more than 400,000 in 2019 to less than 18,000 in 2023.
For Wu Zhengyun, chief executive of the government’s Kinmen-Matsu Shared Services Center, the lack of tourists has been interpreted as punishment from Beijing, he said.
Struggling under pressure
With [cut?] Local business owners have felt the impact of the loss of Chinese tourists, who in the past contributed nearly $200 million to Kinmen’s annual economy.
Noodle shop owner Beddy Chang said Chinese visitors once made up 80 percent of her customer base. Without them, it has now turned to exporting products overseas, he said.
Others, such as Wu Zhengyun – whose family once made and sold Kinmen’s “bomb knives” to tourists – have shifted their businesses to the main island of Taiwan.
“Without tourists on the mainland, we’re out of business,” Wu explained. “We regularly hold events in department stores all over Taiwan.”
But others were less fortunate.
After former restaurant owner Lu Wen Shiung closed his business, he began fishing and offering boat tours to supplement his income. But even that was difficult, he said.
Lu Wen Shiung turned to fishing and boat tours after closing his restaurant in Kinmen.
Source: Jan Camenzind Broomby
After the February 14 incident, China’s coast guard has significantly increased its presence in the region, passing through Kinmen’s restricted waters on several occasions, conducting military exercises in May and even boarding a Taiwanese tour boat in February.
Standing on his small boat in the narrow strait that separates Kinmen and China, Lu said he experienced these escalations firsthand.
He showed video he shot on his phone of Chinese coast guard vessels hitting him as he navigated the waters around Kinmen.
“There’s a little bit of concern that if we get caught while we’re in our waters, we might get some unconventional treatment,” Lou said, looking out at the waves.
Enduring hope
In late July, Taiwanese and Chinese authorities reached an agreement over the February 14 boat incident that allowed the bodies of the dead Chinese fishermen to be returned to the mainland.
In late August, Kinmen local lawmaker Chen Yu Jen traveled to Beijing to discuss the resumption of tourism in Kinmen. She was told that the Chinese tourists would be back soon.
A military outpost on Kinmen Island, Taiwan.
Source: Jan Camenzind Broomby
The first group of mainland tourists arrived at Kinmen at the end of September, according to local media.
The 22 people who arrived for a two-day visit do not represent a full return of Chinese tourism, but it is a start. However, some in Kinmen expressed skepticism that the situation would ever return to the way it once was.
But local driver Chen is optimistic, he said.
“We hope that the people of mainland China can visit Taiwan and Kinmen again to promote economic development on both sides.”
— Translated by Alex Huang and Edison Tseng contributed to this report.