The first scheduled direct flight from China to Hawaii brings a tourism boost of potentially huge dimensions. The expected growth within the next year is modest and improvements in visa policies are needed to turn China into a major source of growth for Hawaii’s travel industry — and economy.

Gov. Neil Abercrombie was on hand Tuesday to greet 271 passengers arriving aboard China Eastern Airlines’ nine-hour inaugural flight, declaring it "the beginning of a new era for us where people from China can travel here for friendship and enjoyment."

At this early stage, however, the Tuesday and Friday flights from Shanghai to Honolulu could bring 91,000 tourists to Hawaii, a 37 percent increase in Chinese arrivals, but still minuscule in comparison with the 1.2 million Japanese visitors to Hawaii last year.

Still, the signs point to higher numbers in the years ahead. With the annual Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting Nov. 7-13 in Honolulu, groups of Chinese journalists have been flown into Hawaii leading up to the summit.

The Singapore-based APEC, which is famous in China, has generated much interest about Hawaii among the Chinese, according to the visiting journalists. Chinese President Hu Jintao is expected to attend the meeting, as is President Barack Obama in his birth state.

Hawaii travel industry leaders are counting on APEC to go one-up on states like California, Nevada, Florida and New York that have been seeking further ties with China, which had an outbound travel market of 40 million in 2009. Hilton Hawaiian Village is among the hotels that have hired Chinese-speaking staff, while Aston Hotels & Resorts and Starwood Hotels & Resorts have opened sales offices in China.

Hawaii hotels and restaurants should begin adding Chinese-language signs and menus next to Japanese signs.

The difficulty by Chinese in obtaining visas will continue to be a problem in the foreseeable future. The average waiting time at the five posts in China for in-person visa interviews is 48 days. For the initial China Eastern flight, the wait took one month, according to a Chinese travel service manager. That’s a promising sign of progress.

Hawaii’s congressional delegation should get behind the request by the newly created federal Travel and Tourism Board that the State Department increase the number of visa posts in China and the number of officers to process the visas. Revenue from visa fees would far exceed the cost of increased visa posts and officers.

Little as the twice-weekly direct airline flights from Shanghai to Honolulu might seem, they open the curtain on what could be a highly important addition to Hawaii’s top economic engine. Hawaii was one of the first states to open a tourism office in China, a visionary move.

With the nonstop flights from there to here now a reality, travel industry and government leaders need to ensure that our island state stays in the forefront of this tourism wave.