Government chief urges greater efforts for swift tourism recovery

Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh made the statement whilst chairing the National Conference on tourism recovery in 2023 with the theme "Accelerating recovery and development" in Hanoi on March 15.

As part of his remarks, Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism Nguyen Van Hung said that in 2020 and 2021, despite being heavily impacted by the pandemic, Vietnamese tourism development capacity index was still increasing, thereby putting it among the three countries with the highest improvements in the world.

Since November, 2021, the nation has piloted schemes to welcome international tourists, officially opening the tourism industry completely from March 15, 2022, an important turning point to promote a strong and vibrant recovery of tourism, including domestic tourism.

These are vivid proofs for Vietnamese tourism development, consolidating confidence in the strong recovery and development moving forward.

Tourism has increasingly affirmed its important position in terms of socio-economic development, thereby contributing to job creation, hunger eradication, poverty reduction, and social security assurance. This is along with preserving and promoting cultural values; environmental protection; maintaining national defense and security and affirming the nation’s image, position, and prestige in the international arena.

However, the tourism sector still faces limitations, such as the number of international visitors in the post-COVID-19 period, despite the rapid growth, being lower than some countries in the region, with the rate of returning international tourists not being as high as expected.

Despite being opening to tourism early, the nation’s rate of international visitors in 2022 compared to 2019 was lower than that of other regional peers. According to a report by the Tourism Advisory Council, the country’s post-COVID-19 tourism recovery index only reached 18.1%, the lowest in the region.

In general, the development of the Vietnamese tourism industry is still far from matching its potential and advantages. The sector is not sustainable as its competitiveness is not high, with it facing numerous huge challenges such as globalization and deep international integration.

Most notably, Industry 4.0 poses many new challenges and difficulties, requiring innovative thinking, new approaches, and new ways of doing things to develop the tourism industry moving forward.

In his speech, PM Chinh said since the national conference on tourism back in 2020, the industry has experienced two difficult years, suffering heavy damage due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Faced with this negative impact, the Government has issued many policies and taken timely support measures in a bid to ease difficulties and damage done to businesses and employees under the motto of safe, flexible adaptation, and effective disease control.

Through the great efforts of the tourism industry, under the leadership of the Party, the management, the administration of the State, the involvement of the whole political system, the companionship and support of the community, along with businesses and people, the Vietnamese tourism market has been gradually restored.

The Vietnamese Government leader pointed out that moving forward both entry and exit barriers will be removed. This move will bring about more opportunities and advantages, but also plenty of difficulties, challenges, and competition between the country and other tourism markets.

In order to develop tourism in order to truly become a spearhead economic sector as Resolution 08 of the Politburo sets forth, the nation must make more efforts in making full use of its distinct potential, outstanding opportunities, benefits, and competitive position of each locality to promote tourism development in the future, PM Chinh emphasized.