Vietnam tourism sector attempts to lure local visitors as borders remain closed

A tourist takes photos of a river in Ninh Binh Province

By Lan Phong
Head of World News, Dantri Online Newspaper, Vietnam

HANOI: Provinces should cooperate to focus on creating new and suitable tours for local visitors while trying to maintain low prices to encourage people to go out on holidays.

That was a directive by the deputy head of the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism (VNAT), Ha Van Sieu, to the local tourism sector at a tourism promotion conference held in the northern province of Ninh Binh which boasts the UNESCO Heritage ofTrang An Landscape Complex.

At the meeting, Ninh Binh authorities were advised to focus on organising spiritual tours to the Bai Dinh Pagoda, known as Southeast Asia’s largest Buddhist complex, for local Buddhists during year-end festivals.

Delegates sign tourism co-operation agreements at the Hung Yen Tourism Promotion Conference

The same message was given by the official at another tourism promotion conference held on November 6 in Hung Yen Province which has great potential to develop agriculture tourism thanks to its large area of fertile land for lush fruits garden and rice fields.

Various events have been held recently by the tourism sector in different localities in Vietnam in an attempt to restore the industry after the Covid-19 pandemic has been brought under control again.

While the country remains closed to foreign arrivals, tourism firms have been asked to change their products to attract local customers.

“Autumn and winter are low seasons for tourism in Vietnam, but many travel firms have run out of budget for promotional or discount campaigns as a results of the Covid-19 hit,” the VNAT official said. “So they should try to attract customers by the quality of their tours and products.”

Speaking at the Hung Yen tourism promotion conference, director of AADASIA Travel and Trading Company, Nghiem Thuy Ha, said that they used to organise adventure tours for European tourists, but since the pandemic, they are turning to conference tours for local customers.

A peaceful village in Hung Yen Province

“Covid-19 is a nightmare but we are still lucky as the situation is being controlled and we have domestic customers,” she said. “I consider it a chance for us to challenge ourselves and see our new potentials. We’re now doing good in our new market.”

According to the Asia-Pacific State of Travel 2020 report by Google, Vietnam’s travel demand has shown a steady recovery as the country overcame the pandemic threat.

The Google report said that in Vietnam, besides essential travel to major cities, there’s been a rising interest from Vietnamese travelers to travel to nature and beach destinations such as Phu Quoc and Da Lat to spend their year-end holidays.

A corner of the Bai Dinh Pagoda

Addressing a National Assembly’s questions-answers session on November 10, Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism Nguyen Ngoc Thien said that a series of tourism promotion programs have been rolled out in a bid to recover the tourism industry in the post-pandemic time, including launching the domestic tourism stimulation programs in the remaining months of 2020 with the top priorities given to safety and attraction, and operating an app on safe travel in the country.

Last year the Pacific Asia Tourism Association (PATA) named Vietnam one of ten top Asia-Pacific tourist destinations and fourth in Southeast Asia after Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore.PATA forecasted that Vietnam is likely to lead the Asia-Pacific region in attracting international visitors from 2019-2023.

In 2019, foreign arrivals rose to a record high of 18 million while the number of domestic tourists reached 800 million, 1.3 times higher than in 2015, bringing the sector’s revenue to USD36 billion, accounting for 9.2% of the GDP.

Buddhists attend a Dharma Talks at Bai Dinh Pagoda in Ninh Binh Province

However, due to negative impacts of Covid-19, Vietnam only welcomed more than 3.8 million foreign arrivals in the first 10 months of 2020, a year-on-year plunge of 80 percent while the number of domestic visitors also dropped by 50 percent against the same period last year.