After six successful versions, the Hue Festival has become well known. During the upcoming Hue Festival 2012, Thua Thien Hue province will introduce unprecedented tourism products in order to bring a new experience in the imperial capital to citizens and tourists. To learn more about this content and the position of the Festival when Thua Thien Hue becomes a centrally governed city, Vietnam Business Forum interviewed Mr Ngo Hoa, Vice Chairman of Thua Thien - Hue Provincial People’s Committee and Head of the Steering Board for Hue Festival 2012. Phan Quang and Y Van report.
From an economic angle, the Festival is a unique competitive value for the province. How will your province utilise this value?
When Hue is mentioned, it always brings to mind the city of Vietnamese festivals. Not only preserving and employing its own particularly competitive value, this festival also links Hue with lands with deep historical and cultural value like France, Russia, China, Mexico, Argentina, Japan, South Korea and Thailand. We are conducting reviews and assessments of previous festival results and completing the construction of “Hue Festival technology.” When this is complete, we will transfer the information to businesses to standardize their approaches to attaining the best results.
With the successful hosting of Hue Festivals, the Prime Minister officially approved the plan to build Hue into a Vietnamese festival city (according to Decision 143/2007/QD-TTg dated August 30, 2007). The Hue Festival 2012 is the second to be held on the Conclusion 48-KL/TW dated May 25, 2009 of the Politburo on construction and development of Thua Thien Hue Province and Hue City through 2020. When Hue becomes a centrally governed city, the Hue Festival will still have a huge impact on socioeconomic development of Thua Thien Hue province which is pursuing an economy of service, industry and agriculture.
Now, we turn to the idea that citizens and visitors are the main players of the festival. Could you please share your opinions about this?
First of all, we have recognized that the Hue Festival will be most successful when it focuses on the local people and visitors, because they are the primary elements of the Festival. The local citizens and visitors are the architects and participants of Hue culture and community events.
International arts ensembles will perform at the Royal Palace and in different places around the province for local people and tourists. Community-centred cultural, ritual and artistic activities include fine-arts exhibitions, road-shows, displays, Hue kite flying art, installation arts, musical arts, street arts, scientific conferences, physical and sporting events, gastronomy and touring. These events will catch the attention of local people and tourists day and night.
It is clear that the people are the centre of the Festival. Without the people and tourists, the Hue Festival could not have been as successful and well-known as it is.
Could you reveal some “hints” about new features of the Hue Festival 2012?
Well, even the enclosure of the Hue Festival 2012 opening ceremony with the start of the National Tourism Year - Northern Central Coast 2012 is a new feature. This Festival will serve as the first festival of the entire National Tourism Year 2012. It will help build the tourism trademark of the Northern Central Region.
The Hue Festival 2012 brings together typical Vietnamese arts programmes, especially Hue royal arts and cultural characteristics from across the country. Besides, many unique arts and cultural programmes will be performed by arts companies from all five continents. Many art troupes representative of major cultures and outstanding artists in contemporary arts (selected from the famous international festivals and arts forms recognised as Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity) will come to Thua Thien Hue on this occasion from historical cities in the world.
The Hue Festival 2012 is a special cultural activity proposed in the framework of the Forum for East Asia-Latin America Cooperation (FEALAC). Especially, at the request of Hue City, the 13th Annual World Conference of The League of Historical Cities (LHC) will be held by Hue City over three days. Coinciding with the festival, the conference will include 80 cities from 55 countries in the world.
Let’s talk about the linkages in tourism economic development. What do you think about this aspect of the Hue Festival 2012?
The National Tourism Year - Northern Central Coast 2012 will be held throughout 2012, with major activities focused in January, February, April, June, July and late months of the year (the ending of the National Tourism Year). From here, we will open connections with former imperial capitals of Vietnam and Northern Central cultural heritages to form a shared trademark. Concerned localities will also have better conditions in forming links and develop their own values. For our part, we will continue carrying out bilateral and multilateral commitments, especially in international cooperation in building national tourism products on the East - West Economic Corridor.
With activities organised, Hue culture and Vietnamese culture in general will continue to thrive. More and more visitors are coming to Hue and to Vietnam, evidence of the strength of tourism of northern central provinces.
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