Ho Chi Minh City increases demand, attracts tourists

These are incentives to take advantage of Resolution 229 on visa exemption policy for citizens of 12 European countries.

That was the information given by the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Tourism at the conference to implement the stimulus plan to attract tourists to the city in 2025, held on August 19.

According to the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Tourism, the implementation of these solutions aims to create attraction for Ho Chi Minh City tourism, so that from now until the end of 2025, the industry will "reach the finish line" of welcoming 10 million international tourists, 50 million domestic tourists and revenue of over 290,000 billion VND.

Linking and creating a product chain to stimulate tourism

At the conference to implement the stimulus plan to attract tourists to the city in 2025 held on August 19, Mr. Ngo Minh Quan - Director of the foreign market division of Vietravel Group - expressed great expectations when the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Tourism launched the tourism stimulus program, especially attracting tourists from 12 new markets exempted from visas when coming to Vietnam.

However, it is not expected that all markets will come to Vietnam, but will choose certain countries to "prepare" to exploit effectively first. According to Mr. Quan, Thailand's tourism has a competitive advantage thanks to low prices, requiring tourism agencies and service agencies to link together to create product chains, bringing the best value to tourists.

"In the coming time, I hope that the department, airlines, and tourism agencies will work together to launch a series of similar products to jointly exploit and attract tourism to Ho Chi Minh City in particular," Mr. Quan said, suggesting that there should be a combination to expand free walking tours for tourists to Ho Chi Minh City, visiting all destinations in the tour product combination package.

Meanwhile, Mr. Nguyen Ky Trung - General Secretary of the Ho Chi Minh City Culinary Association - said that the association's members include many restaurants and hotels, operating in chains and achieving the Mechelin title. In the near future, the association will standardize restaurants and hotels to participate as destinations to join the city's tourism stimulus program.

"But I have proposed that travel and tourism companies coordinate with the Ho Chi Minh City Culinary Association to periodically organize, quarterly or monthly, culinary festivals for the 12 countries that have just been exempted from visas, to attract traffic to Ho Chi Minh City," Mr. Trung proposed.

Applying technology to create new experiences for tourists

Speaking at the conference, Ms. Nguyen Thi Anh Hoa - Director of Ho Chi Minh City Department of Tourism - said that the city is promoting the application of technology and digital transformation to create new and different experiences for tourists.

"The city will continue to coordinate with the business community and technology platforms to form a convenient and rich service ecosystem, making the journey to explore Ho Chi Minh City easier but still bearing its own mark," said Ms. Hoa.

Specifically, according to Ms. Hoa, the cooperation program with Traveloka Vietnam Company Limited from now until the end of 2025 will implement a campaign to promote Ho Chi Minh City destinations on a digital platform and offer a preferential package worth more than 4 billion VND in e-vouchers to tourists when booking air tickets and hotel rooms in the city.

In addition, the Ho Chi Minh City tourism industry also promotes unique culinary values through cooperation with technology platforms. Building a "culinary passport" program.

This is a smart interactive tool, a bilingual publication in English and Vietnamese, helping tourists easily explore and check-in on unique culinary journeys. First of all, the "culinary passport" will be placed at Terminal T3 of Tan Son Nhat airport, metro stations, and tourist attractions...", Ms. Hoa added.

According to Ms. Hoa, this agency also wants to connect and periodically build a culinary festival program to serve tourists from visa-exempt countries, associated with the association's theme. "Restaurants that are "strong" in a certain dish will have a culinary theme for that dish. Each restaurant has a different culinary theme and will organize it periodically every month...", Ms. Hoa suggested.