1.8 million foreign tourists visit Vietnam in Q1

(VEN) – The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism recently announced its tourist attraction results for the first quarter of 2013. Vietnam received more than 1.8 million foreign tourists in the first three months.

According to the reports of Culture, Sports and Tourism Departments of cities and provinces, during the Lunar New Year, the average hotel occupancy rate in some tourism centers such as Ha Long, Sa Pa, Nha Trang, Da Lat, Mui Ne, Vung Tau, Da Nang, Hoi An and Phu Quoc was 85-90 percent (in some places the rate was 100 percent). Tourism businesses and tourist accommodation providers seriously publicized their prices and sold products and services exactly at their publicized prices. Localities intensified supervision over operations and services of tourism businesses to ensure security and safety for tourists and dealt on a timely basis with acts which violated existing regulations or led to a decline in the quality of goods and services as well as arbitrary price increases. Social evils decreased. However, service prices in some places increased by 20-45 percent compared with normal days.

In the first quarter of 2013, the number of visitors to localities as well as their revenues from tourism considerably increased compared with the same period of 2012 (Quang Ninh received over one million visitors, eight percent more than in the first quarter of 2012, with tourism revenue reaching VND385.3 billion, up 14 percent; Hai Phong: 818,628 visitors, up 13.26 percent; tourism revenue VND435.13 billion, up 21.99 percent; Thanh Hoa: 568,720 visitors, up 9.3 percent; tourism revenue VND214.5 billion, up 14.4 percent; Dong Nai: 753,700 visitors, up 10.5 percent; tourism revenue VND180 billion, up 12.8 percent; Ben Tre: 214,000 visitors, up 12.1 percent; tourism revenue VND121.23 billion, up 21.85 percent; Dong Thap: 73,000 visitors, up 51.96 percent).

In the first three months of 2013, Vietnam received more than 1.8 million foreign visitors and tourism businesses served 12.3 million domestic tourists, an increase of 11 percent compared with the same period last year. The number of Russian tourists to Vietnam increased by 50.8 percent; from Indonesia up 21.1 percent; and Thailand up 20 percent.

Experts attributed the tourism sector’s success in the first quarter of 2013 to its efforts to promote trade, advertising and international cooperation in the recent times. The sector took part in the Moscow International Travel and Tourism (MITT) tradeshow in Russia and the ITB fair in Germany; successfully implemented the task of launching a community tourism website as part of a Spain-funded project aimed at improving the capabilities of the Vietnamese tourism sector; launched the sixth national tourism photo contest; organized/participated in the 30th meeting of the Greater Mekong Sub-region (GMS) Tourism Working Group and meetings of the Ayeyawady-Chao Phraya-Mekong Economic Cooperation Strategy (ACMECS), Cambodia-Laos-Myanmar-Vietnam, ASEAN Tourism Forum (ATF 2013), Travex Fair, Mekong-Japan; discussed with the World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) about spiritual tourism and proposed the establishment of the organizing board for an international conference on this type of tourism. The domestic tourism sector also presided over cooperation activities to develop ASEAN river-way tourism, provided information about Vietnam’s tourism to make it available on the ASEAN tourism website. The sector worked with UNWTO experts on the “Silk Road on the Sea” project. It outlined a detailed plan for organizing the 2013 Tourism Promotion Conference, Vietnam International Travel Mart (VITM) Hanoi 2013 and Ho Chi Minh City International Travel Expo (ITE HCMC) 2013. The sector also carried out a research on the actual situation and forecasted development trends of global tourism and proposed future requirements for Vietnamese tourism.

Under circumstances of unfavorable changes in the world and Vietnamese economies, the domestic tourism sector set targets to receive 7.2 million foreign tourists, serve 35 million domestic tourists, and earn revenue of VND190 trillion from tourism in 2013. These targets, in the opinion of tourism experts, are not easy to achieve. Therefore, the leadership of the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism said in the second quarter of 2013, the tourism sector must focus on major tasks such as developing the Tourism Development Strategy to 2020 with a vision towards 2030; tightening management over the quality of tourism products and services; organizing the National Tourism Year of the Red River Delta-Hai Phong 2013; implementing a program designed to stimulate the consumption of tourism products and services along with promoting service development./.

Thanh Tam