From a village known as the "flood center", Tan Hoa has surpassed hundreds of other competitors in the world to win the World's Best Tourist Village award from the World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) in 2023.
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| Tan Hoa Commune, Minh Hoa District, Quang Binh Province. (Source: Quang Binh Department of Tourism) |
Overcoming adversity
Tan Hoa is a mountainous commune in Minh Hoa mountainous district, Quang Binh province. The commune has a natural area of 7,427.20 hectares, located in the middle of limestone mountains, with many cave systems formed over millions of years such as: Chuot Cave, Bat Cave, Tung Cave, Tu Lan Cave...
This unique terrain has created a charming landscape with the inherent peace of a Central Vietnamese village. However, this terrain also poses many risks in natural disasters, especially during the rainy season.
Every year from mid-September to mid-November, when there are heavy, long rains, water from upstream flows down causing major floods that deeply inundate Tan Hoa.
The most memorable was the historic flood in 2010 with a water level of 12m that submerged most of the houses in Tan Hoa, forcing people to evacuate to caves and cliffs to take shelter and wait for the water to recede. Since then, phrases such as: "flood navel", "water valley" have been mentioned and associated with Tan Hoa as a land that suffered a lot of damage from natural disasters.
Finding ways to live with adversity and hardship, Tan Hoa people have come up with many ways, but the most valuable is creating floating houses that float up as the flood waters rise.
Over the years, the floating houses have been improved to better suit their function. Normally, they are just houses like any other, but when floods come, they act as boats carrying valuables, food, clean water and people to help them survive the rainy and flood days.
Mr. Truong Xuan Hung, Vice Chairman of Tan Hoa Commune People's Committee, said that Tan Hoa has about 620 floating houses, every house has at least one to prevent floods. Since the floating houses were built, people have been less worried every time the rainy and stormy season comes.
People here are always proud of the floating houses they make and believe that overcoming adversity and adapting to nature like Tan Hoa is something that is rarely found anywhere else.
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| Weather-adapted houses in Tan Hoa. (Source: VGP) |
In 2011, Oxalis Company Limited came to Tan Hoa to set up its headquarters to invest in exploitation and bring tourists to admire these landscapes. From here, the endless beautiful images of the green grass valley stretching as far as the eye can see or the Tu Lan cave system and the poetic Rao Nan river have reached people all over the world.
In addition, many people have invested in and equipped self-floating houses with more equipment to "magically" transform them into homestays to welcome guests.
Reaching the world
After that, people in Tan Hoa village also started to follow Oxalis to do tourism, find jobs, increase income, and improve their lives. By December 2023, the whole commune had about 120 people working in tourism regularly, with an average income of 8-10 million/month.
Along with that, tourism activities in Tan Hoa commune have also indirectly created jobs for more than a hundred local workers. Local products, food, and foodstuffs that were previously only produced for self-sufficiency are now also used for tourism.
In 2023 alone, people in the commune sold more than 5 billion VND worth of goods for tourism.
According to a report from the Quang Binh Department of Tourism, in the period 2013-2023, the total number of visitors to Tan Hoa was approximately 63,100. The majority of visitors were on the Tu Lan route (more than 45,000 visitors) and the Hang Tien route (more than 18,000 visitors).
International visitors especially love to experience dinner service at local people's homes to discover more about the culture and life of the people in the place known as the "flood center".
The family of Benjamin Edward Leslie, a tourist from Australia, commented: “This was truly a wonderful trip for us. Tan Hoa has caves, you can camp, sleep in tents, and impressive food. We got to experience life in the flood season and immerse ourselves in nature."
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| UNWT awarded the Best Tourist Village certificate to Tan Hoa tourist village. (Source: Quang Binh Department of Tourism) |
Notably, in October 2023, Tan Hoa surpassed hundreds of other competitors in the world to win the World's Best Tourist Village award from the World Tourism Organization (UNWTO). This is the only tourist village in Vietnam to be voted by UNWTO among the list of 260 villages from 60 countries participating in the 2023 competition.
This affirms the determination of the People's Committee of Quang Binh province, the provincial Department of Tourism, the Party Committee, the authorities of Tan Hoa commune, Minh Hoa district and related units in building Tan Hoa into a model of climate-adaptive tourism in Vietnam and a model for the Southeast Asian region.
The Awards are a global initiative that highlights villages where tourism preserves and promotes rural and community-based values, products and lifestyles, while promoting innovation and sustainability. It also recognises villages’ contribution to the Sustainable Development Goals through tourism.
Mr. Ho An Phong, Vice Chairman of Quang Binh Provincial People's Committee, affirmed that being honored as one of the best tourist villages in the world is just the first step in the tourism development roadmap in Tan Hoa.
"This prestigious award is an opportunity for Tan Hoa to step out into the world and gradually become a bright spot in Vietnamese tourism. However, in the process of tourism development, Tan Hoa needs to preserve the cultural identity of Vietnamese villages and not destroy the green living space...", Mr. Ho An Phong emphasized.
The Best Tourism Villages (BTV) Awards are a global initiative of UNWTO to highlight villages where tourism preserves and promotes rural and community-based values, products and lifestyles, while promoting innovation and sustainability. The initiative also recognizes the contribution of villages to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) through tourism. Accordingly, UNWTO has recognized the rich and outstanding cultural and natural resources of Tan Hoa village and the village's commitments and actions in complying with the three main pillars of sustainable tourism development. |
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