Workshop on Eco-tourism Guidebook in Vietnam

The Vietnam National Administration of Tourism (VNAT) coordinated with the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation (AECID) to organise a workshop on "Clarifying the contents of ecotourism guidebook in Vietnam" on March 28, 2012.

 

The workshops is in the framework of “Strengthen the capacity of Vietnamese tourism industry” project funded by the Spanish Government, and “Management and development of ecological tourism” task.

 

Mr Damian Moragues, AECID expert, author of Eco-tourism Guidebook in Spain, presented the concept of ecotourism, ecotourism identification, content of handbook. He also made recommendations for management of natural areas in order to keep balance between exploitation and conservation.

 

He said Vietnam has great potential to develop ecotourism which has not been fully exploited. Some threats in ecotourism in Vietnam are identified as concentration in some tourist sites like Sa Pa and Tam Coc, and risks of losing original cultural identity that visitors are eager to discover.

 

He also said that in order to develop ecotourism, Vietnam should create “open-minded” ecotourism products, both as single destinations and as complementary for other client’s typology, and establish agreements between ministries and institutions involving in natural areas management.