Vinh–Vientiane flight route: Need for sustainable strategy

(Baonghean) - As an international flight route, connecting Vinh City as well as the Central region of Vietnam with Laos and the Northeast region of Thailand, the Vinh - Vientiane flight route is expected to create a driving force to promote economic and trade cooperation and tourism development between the provinces of Laos, the Northeast region of Thailand and the North Central provinces of Vietnam. This is also the basis for opening more flights to other countries in the region, facilitating investment attraction and tourism promotion. However, to exploit the flight route sustainably, a long-term strategy is needed...

Overcoming difficulties

On January 12, 2014, the Vinh - Vientiane international flight route was officially launched with a frequency of 4 flights/week, operating on Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays. This event not only marked the name of Vinh airport on the international flight map but also opened up for Nghe An opportunities for economic development and trade, exchange and learning experiences, and strengthening solidarity and friendship with Laos and the Northeast region of Thailand. The effective exploitation of the Vinh - Vientiane flight route is an important premise for the early adjustment of the International Airport and the opening of other routes in the near future.

Despite the attention and support of the Provincial People's Committee and relevant agencies in completing legal procedures to open the flight route; preparing infrastructure at Vinh airport as well as departments such as security, customs, border police to serve an international flight; coordinating information, communication, widely promoting the flight route to people, agencies and organizations in the North Central provinces; organizing trade promotion activities; establishing an aviation tourism club with attractive and highly competitive tours and routes to propagate, promote, and create all favorable conditions for the flight route to operate effectively...

However, after 8 months of operation, the Vinh - Vientiane international flight route has not really been as effective as expected. By June 2014, Vietnam Airlines had canceled 27 Vinh - Laos flights. Notably, during the peak months of the tourist season, the number of canceled flights remained high. In March 2014, Vietnam Airlines operated 13 flights, with a total of 346 passengers/872 seats available, reaching 40%, with 6 canceled flights. In April 2014, 5 flights were canceled, with an average of nearly 41 passengers/flight. By May, Vietnam Airlines operated only 8 flights, with 9 canceled flights, with an average of 22 passengers/flight. In June, 7 flights had to be canceled because there were no passengers or too few passengers bought tickets.

Faced with that situation, the Provincial People's Committee has coordinated with functional agencies such as the Department of Transport, Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism, Department of Planning and Investment, Department of Information and Communications, Provincial Radio and Television Station, Customs Department, Provincial Police, Vietnam Airlines Branch in Vinh, Business Associations... to continue to coordinate and support the development of the Vinh - Vientiane international flight route. On July 3, 2014, under the chairmanship of Mr. Huynh Thanh Dien - Vice Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee, representatives of relevant units had a meeting to discuss ways to overcome difficulties and find sustainable development directions for the Vinh - Vientiane flight route.

Here, leaders of travel companies, the Vietnam - Laos Friendship Association and a number of related units reflected on the "unattractive" situations at Vinh airport such as airport customs officers being too rigid and unfriendly to passengers on international flights, airport security officers overusing whistles causing unpleasant sounds, cars running haphazardly in the lobby area, ticket price issues... Immediately after that, the Provincial People's Committee also reorganized the Steering Group to Support the Vinh - Vientiane International Flight Route, assigning comrade Nguyen Hong Ky - Director of the Department of Transport as the team leader with leaders of related departments and branches to participate with the aim of strengthening propaganda, promotion and support for the Vinh - Vientiane flight route. The steering group has increased propaganda about flight routes to districts, cities, towns, agencies and units in the province and quickly worked with Vinh Airport, airport customs and airport security to propose improving service quality, strengthening administrative reform and creating the most favorable conditions for passengers during the entry and exit process.

Vinh Airport. Photo: SM

With the synchronous and drastic participation, from the end of July and the beginning of August until now, the Vinh - Vientiane flight route has initially had some certain improvements. In July, there were 628 passengers going and returning on the Vinh - Vientiane flight. In August, there were 412 flights from Vinh - Vientiane and about the same number of passengers using the opposite flight. The total number of passengers from the flight's launch to mid-August reached 5,664 for both outbound and return flights. Passengers going and returning on the Vinh - Vientiane flight also no longer complain much about the service attitude or the rigidity of customs or airport security staff. Vietnam Airlines' system has also recorded nearly 100 customers booking tickets in advance for September and October. According to Vietnam Airlines Vinh branch's forecast, in the last months of the year, there will be nearly 3,200 passengers using the Vinh - Vientiane route, including more than 1,500 passengers traveling from Vinh to Vientiane. Seat utilization will also gradually increase, especially during the Lunar New Year, when the number of passengers traveling between the two countries and especially the number of overseas Vietnamese returning home for Tet increases...

Need sustainable solutions

However, it can be affirmed that the recent improvements of the Vinh - Vientiane flight route are just the beginning and not really sustainable. Passengers using the route have not been expanded to other groups such as tourists, relatives, students, Vietnamese and Lao businessmen, but are still limited to groups of guests supported by the Flight Support Steering Committee. The number of individual passengers and out-of-province passengers is not much.

Talking about the difficulties of the Vinh - Vientiane flight route, Ms. Tran Thi Khanh Ngoc - Head of the market department of Vietnam Airlines branch in Vinh said that the promotion work is still not really effective. Currently, people in neighboring provinces such as Thanh Hoa and Ha Tinh do not know much about this flight route. Especially for people in Laos and overseas Vietnamese in the Northeast of Thailand, information about the flight route as well as tours and tourist routes in Vietnam is still limited, so it has not attracted many visitors from Laos to Vietnam.

In addition, travel and tourism companies have not yet built attractive, interconnecting tours between Thailand - Laos - Vinh and attractive tourist destinations in the Central region such as Quang Binh, Hue, Da Nang, etc. In September, Vietnam Airlines will continue flight support programs such as ticket price promotions, adjusting flight times from 7:05 to 11:00 am and using planes from Da Nang - Vinh to fly the Vinh - Vientiane route (so far, they have used planes from Hanoi - Vinh). Vietnam Airlines hopes that changing flight times will also create conditions to attract passengers on the Ho Chi Minh City - Vinh to Vientiane route and create a connection circle of Ho Chi Minh City - Vinh - Vientiane; Da Nang - Vinh - Vientiane, etc.

Mr. Vi To Dinh - Vice President of the Vietnam - Laos Friendship Association of Nghe An province said that the general assessment of members as well as Lao and Vietnamese tourists is that the ticket price of Vietnam Airlines is still a bit high compared to the cost of traveling by car. Besides, the service provider has not had many forms of widespread promotion in Laos.

Mr. Nguyen Manh Cuong - Deputy Director of the Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism of the province said that in recent times, the Department has coordinated with agencies and departments to strengthen measures to promote and propagate the flight route. Currently, two large-sized advertising banners about the flight route at the golf course and the Morning Market of Laos have been completed. The Department also requested travel agencies to quickly build tours to exploit the flight route, especially to attract more tourists from the three countries of Vietnam, Laos and Thailand to use the flight route. However, the effectiveness of the promotion programs is still not very clear.

Mr. Vu Van Duc - an employee of Vietravel Tourism Company - Vinh Branch (one of 4 members of the Air Travel Club) said: In the first 6 months of 2014, the company organized 7 groups, each group of 15 - 20 guests, but only 3 groups traveled by air, the rest traveled by road. The trend of customers still traveling by road is more, mainly because the current airfare is quite high compared to the price of traveling by road. For example, the same 3-day tour, if traveling by road, only costs about 4.5 million VND and takes 1 more day of travel time, but if traveling by air, it costs about 5.7 million VND...

Before launching the Vinh - Vientiane route, Vietnam Airlines as well as the Department of Transport and related units conducted a thorough survey on the demand for travel between Nghe An - Laos - Thailand. The potential of the route is huge, not only serving tourists because every day, thousands of people travel between the two countries by road through the Nam Can and Cau Treo border gates. In the near future, when Vietnam and Thailand sign a labor cooperation agreement, there will be a large number of people from the Central region going through Laos and then to Thailand to work. In particular, in 2015, when the tariff barriers in the ASEAN bloc are basically eliminated, the amount of goods from Thailand through Laos will certainly flow into Vietnam, followed by businesses and traders with an increasing demand for using the Vinh - Vientiane route.

The potential is there, but if Vietnam Airlines and related units do not have long-term, sustainable programs and do not gradually create the habit of flying from Vinh to Laos, the international route will certainly be difficult to succeed. To do this, in addition to the efforts of the province, the Flight Support Team and related sectors, the main responsibility belongs to the aviation industry. Many people believe that Vietnam Airlines has not really taken part and has relied too much on Nghe An province to promote flights in Laos and Thailand as well as find long-term measures to stimulate demand and develop flights sustainably. Therefore, in addition to coordinating with functional sectors to streamline and classify customer groups to have a more long-term, regular and long-term propaganda and promotion strategy, Vietnam Ailiner should also have a classification to offer preferential prices suitable for each type of group, for example, individual customers, group customers, students... to create a habit of traveling by air to ensure stable and effective exploitation of flight routes.

Nguyen Khoa - Gia Huy