This paper firstly put forward that regional tourism cooperation was necessary for the sustainable development of tourism in china. Secondly, the paper set up theoretical framework of regional tourism cooperation from four aspects, which include the mechanism of regional tourism cooperation, industrialization of tourism development, technological support for tourism cooperation, and spatial organic forms of regional tourism cooperation. The paper indicated that regional tourism cooperation was the organizing process of resources and markets. Thirdly, the case study of tourism cooperation of Xuzhou city and Lianyungang city was given. The paper attached great importance to building the Xu-Lian tourism belt and establishing the jointed development pattern to exploit the seashore resources and culture resources in northern part of the Jiangsu province. The paper described the construction of the Xu-lian tourism belt and the jointed pattern in details. Three advantages for tourism cooperation of the two cities were analyzed: ① two cities made up of regional dual-nuclei symbiosis, ②their tourism resources were complementary, ③their tourism markets were connected.
Based on these advantages, Xuzhou city cooperated with Lianyungang city in the exploitation of nature resources and culture resources, "3S" and "3N" resources,which were Sunny, Sand, Sea and Nature, Nostalgia, Nirvana, and constituted the core of the tourism resources in two cities. Regional tourism cooperation should follow Positive-Sum game principle, avoid Zero-Sum game, form cooperation-competing model. The purpose of Xu-lian tourism belt construction was to build the third tourism "hot area" in Jiangsu province, in addition to Ning-zhen area and Su-xi area which were booming in tourism. Finally, the paper discussed five strategical measures for construction Xu-lian tourism belt, such as government role and organization oriented, integrating tourism development, co-promotion in marketing, spatial structure evolved, development based on internet or intranet.