(Xinhua)
Updated: 2008-04-11 21:09

Tibet received more than 365,000 foreign tourists last year. Both the government and businessmen in tourism sectors hope the market could expand this year.

Run by the US-based Tibet Poverty Alleviation Fund, Dropenling Shop has been selling local traditional handcrafts to tourists. It earned more than 2 million yuan (US$ 286,000) last year, a large part from foreign tourists.

But the staff member predicted the market would not return to normal until May. The shop began to sell art online so as to explore overseas markets.

For Chinese businessmen, the Lhasa violence last month seemed not to have dampened their confidence in the potential of the market.

Landun, one of Lhasa's biggest shops selling children's clothes, opened its first floor, although rebuilding and decoration had not even started.

The four-storey shop was burnt and looted, leaving the owner Jia Xuanchi with little to sell.

Jia came from eastern Zhejiang Province and has been doing business in Lhasa for 25 years.

"The government has worked out some preferential policies for affected businessmen.I'm not going to give up the market in Lhasa, " he said.

He has a reason to stay. Shoppers crowded on Friday at the former site of fire and destruction, disregarding the black walls and disordered arrangement of clothes. Besides, according to the government's promise, he will not have to pay personal income tax from March 1 this year to April 28, 2010.

The Lhasa violence caused an economic loss of 280 million yuan (US$ 40 million) in property damage. Many shops on Duosenge Road were still closed after the riots because of a lack of business, but owners left their names and contacts on their doors, telling customers that they would return one day.

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