Vietnam is participating in the London International Tourism Fair taking place on November 14-17, in a move to further promote local tourism to the world and ink tourism cooperation with international partners, sources from the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism (VNAT) revealed.
The country’s most favored tourism products and special cultural and tourism features will be showed at an 45 sq.m apartment at the fair, VNAT said, adding that it will also attend several important seminars on tourism development methods and negotiate with 11 of the world’s leading travel firms for bilateral co-operation.
The annual major meeting of world’s top travel firms this year gathers 200 representatives from 200 nations worldwide.
In a related development, Vietnam welcomed the three millionth international tourist to Vietnam this year on Friday. That was a Japanese woman on her third trip to Vietnam, VNAT said.
A special party was held at Tan Son Nhat International Airport in Ho Chi Minh City to greet Furuya Oakana as she stepped off the aircraft.
Furuya said Vietnam could soon expect a major influx of Japanese tourists to the country, adding that Vietnam is a safe destination, offering delicious food specialties, fine handicrafts and diverse health and beauty services.
For the first time in 1994, foreign arrivals in Vietnam surpassed the one-million mark. After 11 years, the figure has tripled. The performance reflects the steady growth of Vietnam's tourism sector with markedly improved service quality being recognized by tourists from different part of the world.
Vietnam hopes to attract 3.5 million international arrivals and 15 million domestic holidaymakers in 2005, earning VND30 trillion (US$1.91 billion) from tourism services, and posting respective year-on-year increases between 10-15 per cent.
Vietnam ranks seventh in the 2005 Top Ten List of Travel & Tourism economies, with an estimated annual growth rate ranging from 7.2 to 7.9 percent, according to VNAT sources.
Investment, VNA
Vietnamese
