KATHMANDU, Xinhua– Chinese actress Xu Qing has been conferred as the tourism goodwill ambassador for the Visit Nepal Year (VNY) 2020 campaign.

At a special function in Kathmandu on Saturday, the Chinese actress was conferred the goodwill ambassador by Nepali Minister for Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation Yogesh Bhattarai for the promotion of Nepal’s tourism.

Addressing the ceremony, the minister said that campaign will now take a qualitative turn as a Chinese celebrity with a large number of followers on social media is now the goodwill ambassador for the campaign.

In response, Xu thanked Nepal for the nomination and said, “I am really happy to be part of this campaign.”

The announcement comes at a time when Nepal is preparing to celebrate a year-long VNY campaign in 2020 with a target to welcome 2 million foreign tourists.

China is the second largest tourism source market for the Himalayan country.