13th Tourism Advisory Board Meeting

   The Tourism Advisory Board (TAB) was established in 2012, which significantly provided its consultancy to Vietnam National Administration of Tourism (VANT) and the Government of Viet Nam in terms of policy review, tourism promotion, human resources, and competitiveness development. On the 9th October 2018, in Ha Noi, TAB organized its 13th meeting, in the situation the tourism industry is preparing for a Strategy on Viet Nam tourism development to 2030, vision to 2050. At this meeting, TAB is also discussing the preparation for Viet Nam Tourism Forum 2018, expectedly to be held at the end of this year. Mr. Le Quang Tung, Vice Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism, Mr. Nguyen Van Tuan, Chairman of VNAT; Mr. Tran Trong Kien, Chairman of TAB co-chaired the meeting. The other participants include TAB members, Mr. Ha Van Sieu – VNAT Vice Chairman and representatives from VNAT line and functional departments, representatives of the EU Delegation to Viet Nam, among other invitees.

   Mr. Le Quang Tung, Vice Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism delivered opening remarks. He highlighted the public-private partnership, which has been made effective use in orientation, policy advice, and especially contribution for the strategy on Viet Nam tourism development to 2030, vision to 2050. It also makes effective use of such other aspects as Viet Nam tourism promotion, investment development, and restructuring tourism industry. Mr. Nguyen Van Tuan, Chairman of VNAT presented his pleasure to update Viet Nam tourism situation and its remarkable achievements. In particular, for the first 9 months of 2018, we received 11.6 million international tourist arrivals, serving 60 million domestic tourists. As of October 2018, the average growth rate is 22.9%, equivalent to the figure of the last year 2017. In 2018, Viet Nam tourism expectedly welcome about 15.7 – 16 million international tourist arrivals. Especially, Ministry of Industry and Trade and Vietnam Electricity (EVN) endorsed the dispatch to the Government on the adjustment of electricity rate for the hotel industry, saving about 30-35% of electricity cost compared to it was previously. Regarding the Tourism development fund, it is supposed to be submitted to the Prime Minister (expectedly before 22nd October).

   At the meeting, the presentations by TAB working groups were consecutively delivered. The issues were raised as follows: Encouraging Vietnamese to stay in the industry in Vietnam, and attracting Vietnamese to choose the Hotel/Tourism industry; instant/ overheated growth, impacts of climate change on the tourism industry, solutions to be addressed for managing new kind of accommodation such as condotel, airbnb, and so on with appropriate legal framework, mobilization of investment resources in society, and the compliance with the law; Supporting VNAT in preparation of booths at national tourism promotion in ITB Berline (7-11 March 2018) and WTM London 2018 (05-07/11/2018); Renaming the Board as the Vietnam Tourism Advisory Board.

Vice Minister Le Quang Tung speak at the meeting

   At the discussion session, the participants contributed to the interventions on draft Decision by the Prime Minister on Strategy on Viet Nam tourism development to 2030, vision to 2050. TAB members focused on the strategy’s time, vision and objectives, in which they are likely too high, requiring unanimous development, thus, they require necessary and sufficient conditions of strengthening and inter-sectoral coordinating among stakeholders and regions. As a result, it leads to concerns about the policies improvement, namely, visas, aviation liberalization, human resources, and environmentally and socially responsible tourism development. As one of the key factors for the future tourism development is the products and marketing, it is pointed out that products should be systematically and classifiably developed together with the linkages among regions and areas, and the infrastructure improvements. MICE tourism products, specifically, need proper infrastructure development such as Expo Centers. Tourism markets should be developed in Viet Nam, Southeast Asia and the world. 

   As Travel & Tourism Summit Vietnam 2018 is going to be organized, whose theme is proposed as Vietnam Tourism Development for Quality and Sustainability – Vision to 2030, the TAB Secretariat requested its members to participate in, contribute to the discussion and presentations. 

   After the discussion, Vice Minister Le Quang Tung expressed the viewpoints of the Ministry on supporting TAB in strengthening and naming Viet Nam Tourism Advisory Board. He stressed on the necessity to study and review the TAB organizational and operational regulation to properly response to the new situation. Mr. Tung also affirmed that it is the responsibility of the Strategy drafting committee to send the detail proposal to TAB members for further reference. TAB members are requested to actively send comments/ inputs to VNAT so that the interventions in business perspective can be included.

Group photo of meeting participants

Chien Thang