Vietnam’s marine attractions capture great European interest
European visitors including representatives of travel companies crowded the Vietnam Sea Festival that took place at the fashion center Pierre Cardin in the French capital city of Paris last week.
The first major Sea Festival of diverse business and cultural activities ever held in France attracted nearly 60 leading travel companies from European countries including Britain, France, Germany, Russia and the Netherlands, according to Vietnam Airlines.
Vietnam Airlines general director Pham Ngoc Minh said the number of participating travel companies showed the Vietnamese market had drawn great interest of European tour operators and travelers.
Minh said as the visitors to Vietnam from the Western Europe was on the decline, Vietnam Airlines and other entities staged a major promotion event in order to bring back travelers from this market.
Vietnam Airlines held and sponsored the Sea Festival in collaboration with the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, the Vietnamese Embassy in France and the Bank for Investment and Development of Vietnam to promote Vietnam’s tourism in the context of global economic recession.
The Vietnam News Agency quoted Minh of Vietnam Airlines as saying that the country had great potential for tourism, especially beautiful landscapes and tranquil beaches along its coastline of more than 3,000 kilometers.
Minh also highlighted the country’s reputation as being home to UNESCO-listed heritage sites including Halong Bay in the north, Phong Nha-Ke Bang Caves and the former imperial citadel of Hue in the central region.
The national flag air carrier spent around 90,000 euro promoting the Sea Festival on more than 1,500 panels at metro stations in Paris before the event kicked off.
Most European visitors were impressed with Vietnam’s coastal attractions as well as marine tourism services. However, they agreed that the country was not very competitive in price or service quality.
Experts urged Vietnam to consider falling demand for travel worldwide as an opportunity to enhance tourism services and adjust tour prices so to attract more international visitors and to better compete with regional destinations.
The Vietnam News Agency quoted journalist Jean Claude Cartier as saying that tours and airfares in other countries were lower and that they had more diverse and quality services.
“If Vietnam can overcome these factors, the country could become the region’s leading tourist destination,” Cartier said.
Figures show the number of international visitors to Vietnam in the first four months of this year dropped by 17.8% year-on-year to nearly 1.3 million, though the arrivals in April was up 0.6% on the month before to more than 305,000.
The number of foreigners traveling by air to Vietnam in the first four months was 1.12 million, down 10% on the year earlier period while those coming by sea plunged by more than 63%.
To counter the impact of global economic turbulence on international arrivals, the local tourism sector is expected to offer more promotions as part of the national tourism campaign announced earlier this year.
Vietnam Airlines has pledged to offer fare discount of up to 25% for those travel agents who arrange tours for French visitors to Vietnam from April to June and from August to October as part of special promotion programs for travelers from this European market.
The airline plans to operate at least one more flight from Paris, Frankfurt of Germany and Moscow of Russia to Vietnam from October this year to meet anticipated increasing demand for air travel from these markets.
The national tourism industry expects to attract at least 4.3 million international travelers this year, or 500,000 more than last year. However, this number has turned out to be a hard target to realize in a time when the global crunch has dealt a heavy blow to the tourism industry.
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