Deputy Prime Minister Vuong Dinh Hue: 'The whole country does tourism, the whole people do tourism'

“The cost of organizing festivals is more than the revenue, while the relics are closed if they do not have investment funds. Many times, comrades just consider tourism as a form of entertainment, not an economic sector. When coming to Vietnam to travel, the biggest fear is being ripped off!”

Politburo member and Deputy Prime Minister Vuong Dinh Hue emphasized this when chairing a meeting to collect comments on the "Project on Orientation for Developing Vietnam's Tourism Industry into a Spearhead Economic Sector", which took place on the afternoon of July 15 at the Government headquarters.

Opening the meeting, Mr. Nguyen Ngoc Thien - Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism (MCST) reported on the content of the Project on Orientation for the Development of Vietnam's Tourism Industry to Become a Key Economic Sector, emphasizing the goal of striving to attract 14-15 million international visitors to Vietnam by 2020, with an average growth of 12-14%/year in the 2015-2020 period; contributing 9-1% of GDP. Setting a target of 14-15 million international visitors, total revenue from tourists from 29-32.5 billion USD, growth of 14-16%/year in the 2015-2020 period...

Deputy Prime Minister Vuong Dinh Hue chaired a meeting to comment on the Project on Orientation for the Development of Vietnam's Tourism Industry to Become a Spearhead Economic Sector.

Sharing the same view, Deputy Prime Minister Vu Duc Dam and representatives of ministries, branches and localities attending the meeting also said that the Project on Orientation for Developing Vietnam's Tourism Industry to Become a Key Economic Sector proposed by the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism was not achieved. Moreover, the difficulties and weaknesses of the tourism industry mentioned in the Project according to the Government leaders and representatives of ministries and branches are "too light", it is necessary to clarify that the tourism industry still has many weaknesses compared to its potential and competitive advantages...

“This issue must be looked at frankly from within the tourism industry. The tourism industry itself has not yet recognized tourism as an economic sector. This is the most important factor and cannot be blamed on this or that sector for not coordinating,” Deputy Prime Minister Vuong Dinh Hue affirmed.

According to Deputy Prime Minister Vuong Dinh Hue, tourism is a service-based economic sector, with a comprehensive, inter-sectoral, inter-regional nature and a high degree of socialization. There must be a measure and criteria for this sector. The whole country does tourism, the whole population does tourism, not just the cultural tourism sector.

Foreign tourists were ripped off at Hoan Kiem Lake - Hanoi (photo: Huu Nghi)

Many paradoxes were pointed out by the comrade, such as the cost of organizing the festival being more than the amount of money earned. The Deputy Prime Minister cited: "When I went to Hue, I saw that only the ancient capital had been exploited, the remaining ten or so relics were all abandoned. When asked, they said that there was no investment capital to exploit tourism, so they closed it and left it there... This is a problem with the mindset of doing tourism, why close it, just let the private sector do it and the State collects taxes."

Comparing the methods and effectiveness of tourism between Vietnam and other countries, Deputy Prime Minister Vuong Dinh Hue cited the Angkor Wat temple in Cambodia which earns up to 360 million USD each year, while the vast Hue Imperial City in Vietnam only earns about 100 million USD each year.

According to Dantri