Heritage Tourism - Sketching a Path

Green tea region of Thai Nguyen .

Tea hills become visual aids

Stepping into the well-invested Tien Yen Farmstay, anyone is truly "overwhelmed" and fascinated by the green nature and the cooperative's way of doing business. Tien Yen Farmstay has a beautiful landscape, a system of small concrete roads up to nearly 1,000m in the tea hill area for visitors to conveniently travel and visit, there is a lake, a bridge creating a backdrop for visitors to take photos; there are huts around the lake for visitors to sit and enjoy tea, sightsee and fish...

Tan Cuong, Thai Nguyen is a famous tea region, tea land. Dai Nam Nhat Thong Chi of Nguyen Dynasty (1802-1945) once confirmed. "I am the third generation in my family to make tea, and Tan Cuong tea region has been around for hundreds of years", Bui Trong Dai is proud of his hometown and family tradition.

Regarding tea cultivation, according to Director Bui Trong Dai, Tien Yen Cooperative has a tea growing area of more than 2 hectares, of which 1 hectare is the ancient midland tea variety. The Cooperative also cooperates with tea growing households, so the area of raw materials is up to 30 hectares. Director Bui Trong Dai said that 5 hectares/30 hectares of tea production have organic certification; harvesting and processing always ensure strict domestic and international technical and quality standards, and safe products according to VietGAP standards.

Regarding processing, Tien Yen Cooperative, participating in the One Commune One Product (OCOP) Program, has Clove Tea, a 4-star OCOP product. Thanks to that, the selling price of the product is also about 20% higher than before.

Regarding tourism , realizing the trend that more and more people want to find peaceful places to enjoy life in the most comfortable way, the Cooperative is taking the lead in "opening a new direction" for Thai Nguyen Tea Land, which is opening Homestay service, welcoming tourists to relax and experience community tourism about tea culture. Tien Yen Homestay currently has 6 5-star standard rooms and 1 community room with a capacity of 40 - 45 tourists.

The “good news” has spread far and wide. On average, there are about 10 international groups coming to experience it each month. I asked Director Bui Trong Dai if there are any high school students visiting every year. He smiled and said: “Of course, we are turning the tea hills, the production site, into visual teaching aids”. That is a positive signal.

The slogan of Tien Yen Farmstay is “Experience the land of tea - Rich in identity”. Tien Yen Cooperative is doing the best in that direction. There are two dialectical aspects here, tea products “give wings” to tourism and vice versa, tourism makes tea products and tea culture spread more and more.

Currently, Tien Yen Farmstay has connected with travel agencies, through mass media, and social networking applications to welcome guests to experience Tan Cuong tea culture. La Bang Tea Cooperative and Hao Dat Tea Cooperative have initially converted to digital to market and spread the values of Thai Nguyen's tea products and tea culture.

Opportunity to explore and experience

Green space at Tien Yen Tea and Community Tourism Cooperative - a destination for cultural experiences and eco-tourism. Photo: Kim Ngan

Thai Nguyen is a land rich in historical traditions and cultural sediments, including many ranked and honored heritages.

The “business story” of the tourism economy here is also about exploiting cultural heritages, how to create attractive and unique tourism products and services, while preserving and promoting the value of those heritages is always an urgent question. The solution not only brings economic benefits, but also promotes the image and cultural identity of the nation, educating the traditions of the homeland for future generations.

After the merger, Thai Nguyen province has nearly 1,200 historical, cultural and scenic relics, including 3 special national relics, 67 national relics, 322 provincial relics and hundreds of unclassified relics. The province also has 43 intangible cultural heritages that have been recognized at the national level. Among these, many cultural heritages have become complete cultural and tourism products, gradually changing the local economic structure, bringing practical and sustainable benefits to the community.

In Thai Nguyen today, there are many innovative business models. Indeed, many private economic units have become famous and are “on the way” to building their brands. Cooperative economic models in Thai Nguyen all have products that achieve OCOP from 4 to 5 stars.

In particular, these economic organizations all apply modern production technology, digital transformation; improve product quality and strictly apply national standards on food safety, commercial goods... All products are given QR codes to trace their origin and apply BlockChain to inspect the quality of all stages in a modern way, giving customers absolute trust.

Mr. Do Trong Hiep, Director of Da Huong International Travel Company, Chairman of Thai Nguyen Tourism Association said that there are not many international tourists coming to Thai Nguyen, mainly domestic tourists and they only visit the typical tea hills; other famous places such as Ba Be Lake, Nui Coc Lake, ATK Dinh Hoa, ATK Cho Don... Currently, Thai Nguyen province still has many things to do after the merger, so tourism development projects have to wait.

It must be admitted that Thai Nguyen has made many efforts to develop cultural tourism products, associated with preserving and promoting the values of cultural heritages, exploiting diverse and unique strengths to form unique and different tourism products.

At the same time, develop community tourism, agricultural tourism (tea tourism), eco-tourism. Tourists coming to Thai Nguyen increasingly have the opportunity to explore and experience tourism products, OCOP products, and the unique tea culture of Thai Nguyen.

Has anyone ever attended a party where all the dishes have the flavor of sweet soup? It is definitely new in Thai Nguyen. It is a new element on the “path” of exploiting heritage tourism.