Top Vietnam Tourism Events in 2007

On December 21, 2007, the Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism issued the Decision No. 564/QD-BVHTTDL to launch the Action Programme of Tourism Industry to carry out the Resolution 16/2007/NQ-CP on the introduction of the Government’s Post-WTO Action Programme. This action programme determines specific goals and tasks of relevant central and local state tourism authorities and tourism companies to grasp opportunities and overcome challenges to bring Vietnam into a new development era and fulfil development goals set in the Vietnam Tourism Development Strategy for the 2001-2010 period.

This is an orienting document for the 2007-2012 development period of the Vietnamese tourism to turn Vietnam into a country with developed tourism.

On the occasion of 60^th anniversary of late President Ho Chi Minh’s visit to ATK military zone, the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism (VNAT) and the Thai Nguyen Province People’s Committee solemnly opened Thai Nguyen National Tourism Year 2007 on February 27, 2007 in Thai Nguyen City.

The Thai Nguyen National Tourism Year 2007 was one of a rare opportunity for our Party and People to review heroic struggle our nation and the might of our Party. At the same time, this was a chance for Thai Nguyen and the Northwest to tap ecological, cultural and historical tourism potentialities to make the region prosperous.

The New Open World, a Swiss nongovernment organisation, launched a programme to vote for Seven Natural World Wonders. The Ha Long Bay was shortlisted as a nominee although it won the World Natural Heritage twice by UNESCO. The nomination of the Organising Board reaffirmed the beauty of Ha Long Bay –an unseen beauty in other places in the world. This is a rare chance for Vietnam to popularise its beauties, hospitality and potentiality of Vietnamese people to the world. The Vietnam National Administration of Tourism launched a programme to vote for Ha Long Bay. The final result will be announced on August 8, 2008.

During the Ho Chi Minh City International Tourism Exhibition (ITE HCMC 2007) which took place from October 4-6, 2007 in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam held the first high-ranking tourist authorities meeting with the attendance of Laos and Cambodia. This event showed the active promotion of tourism development with Laos and Cambodia and marked a tighter tourism cooperation of the three nations.

Tourism ministers of the three countries signed a joint tourism statement, called three nations - one destination, from the cooperation consolidation in building slogan, logo, and tourism products. This will be a foundation for the development of tourism in the three nations and the “Three nations, one destination” cooperation programme is a pitch for the regional and global tourism.

Video clip on the Vietnamese tourism on CNN channel was aired from October 10, in three consecutive months in golden hours. The 30-second video clip was professionally produced by CNN experts, showing typical sceneries in northern, central and southern regions. Vietnam has rich culture, marvellous handicrafts, astronomy, traditional fashion and simplicity of Vietnamese people.

The Vietnamese tourism industry welcomed the 4,000,000^th tourist December 6, in 2007, Mr Michael David Magidson, an American. This was an outstanding event in 2007 and it was a milestone in the development of the Vietnamese tourism industry. The reception of Mr Magidson fulfilled this year’s goal of serving 4-4.4 million international visitors, an increase of 18 per cent against 2006 and created a momentum for the goal of serving 6-6.5 million international visitors in 2010.

Da Lat Flower Festival was successfully organised from December 15-21 with the participation of more than 100 enterprises of 24 provinces and cities nationwide and seven flower exporting countries namely the Netherlands, North Korea, Japan, Belgium, Denmark and China.

The event played an important role in the tourism development and the building of Da Lat Flower trademark.
Giang Tu