The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and representatives of 17 travel firms started a six-day promotion program on August 25 in China, the biggest source market of the country’s inbound tourism, a tourism official said.
The activities to promote Vietnam’s tourism are scheduled to take place in Shanghai, Henan, Guangzhou and Shenzhen.
Vu The Binh, head of the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism under the ministry, told the Daily that the first day of the program would be for discussions between the Vietnamese and Chinese tourism authorities. The promotion activities and business meetings will take place in the next days.
Vietnam will promote overland and sea tourism, the two most popular kinds of tourism for Chinese tourists in Vietnam, and tours to Vietnam by air.
“Chinese tourists are familiar with tourist sites in the north, that’s why we want to present beautiful images of beaches in the central region as well as attractions in the south, especially HCMC and the Mekong Delta,†Binh said.
The Vietnam tourism agency has selected six travel companies to receive Chinese guests who travel to the country by tourist boats from Beihei, China to the northern province of Quang Ninh.
On April 22, after over three years of suspension, overland travel via the Huu Nghi border gate in northern Lang Son province was reopened.
However, the number of Chinese visitors has dropped in recent years. Over the first seven months of this year, just over 263,000 people visited the country, down 37% year-on-year.
In 2007, the country welcomed 150,000 Chinese tourists from Beihei but only 70,000 in 2008. The number of visitors to Vietnam via the Huu Nghi border gate reached 1,000 per day in April. Now the border gate welcomes around 1,000 guests per month.
“We need activities to recover the visitors. Along with problems regarding transportation policies, lack of information costs Chinese tourists,†Binh said.
The number of Chinese tourists to the south is small because not many people know that Vietnam has agreed to allow such travelers to take local flights around the country.
Binh said that Vietnam’s tourism would join the yearly China International Travel Mark Kunming in China in November.
VietNamNet/SGT
