Kien Giang Tourism: Many Favourable Conditions for Development

The provincial Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism has well completed tasks such as advising the province to organise many important ceremonies and events, such as the ceremony to announce the master plan for tourism development in Kien Giang towards 2020 and orientation to 2030; announce the tourism product "the Mekong Delta - One destination, four localities +", and hold the business conference to celebrate World Tourism Day (September 27^th).

 

The Department has also actively collaborated with the Literature and Art Association to organise the photo contest "Kien Giang Tourism - Spring 2012", organized two tourism photo exhibitions in Rach Gia city, Ha Tien town; implemented "Kien Giang multimedia travel guide book " (lookup software includes two versions: Vietnamese and English); and released 100 VCDs about Kien Giang for travel companies and transportation units to promote Kien Giang tourism.

 

The Department has also played a role as the chief coordinator for tourism cooperation programmes for provinces in the Mekong Delta key economic region. It has also collaborated with the localities to conduct surveys and research to build a common tourism product called "Mekong Delta – One destination, Four localities+" and announced to put it into operation.

 

The activities of Kien Giang Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism have created good conditions for Kien Giang tourism development. However, according to the Department, because of the difficult situation, in 2012 tourist arrivals to Kien Giang did not increase significantly. According to statistics, the total arrivals to Kien Giang in 2012 were over 5.5 million, an increase of 10.1 percent over the same period. In particular, international visitors to Kien Giang in 2012 reached 163,400, an increase of 8.6 percent over the same period, reaching 102.1 percent of the year’s plan. In 2012, Kien Giang earned VND913.5 billion from tourism, up 21.5 percent over 2011, reaching 102.6 percent of the year’s plan.

 

In 2013, the Kien Giang tourism sector will also strive to welcome 5,882,000 arrivals with total revenue of VND1,172 billion. The department will complete the project "Building strategy to develop Kien Giang’s tourism product by 2020 with the vision to 2030", the project "Development of Kien Giang’s tourism human resources by 2020, towards 2030", and the overall planning of the construction and installation of signs for resorts and tourist routes in the province of Kien Giang period 2012-2015.

 

To support businesses in the tourism sector in particular, and culture and sports in general, the Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism will further promote the work of the administrative reform, continue to improve the system of quality management according to Standard Vietnam ISO 9001: 2008 in licensing, at the same time decentralizing state management for local tourism in the spirit of Circular 43/2008/TTLT-BVHTTDL-BNV of the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and the Ministry of the Interior.

 

In addition to promoting the establishment of Provincial Tourism Association, the Department also extended exchange relations, international cooperation in culture, sports and tourism and enhanced exchange in arts and sports, and sent staff to study experience management of culture, sports and tourism in other countries.

 

To accomplish these tasks, the Department has asked for the recognition of its two monuments, namely U Minh Thuong Historic Revolutionary Monument and Phu Quoc Prison; proposed issuing regulations on the management of national tourism area and the recognition of national and local tourism destinations.