Vietnam has a rich culture and strong national identity. This is a great resource for developing attractive cultural tourism products. In fact, cultural tourism is becoming an important service economic sector of the country.
Carp releasing ceremony to welcome Spring at Thang Long Imperial Citadel. Photo: VNAImportant service sector
In the Strategy for the Development of Vietnam's Cultural Industries to 2020, with a Vision to 2030, the Government has identified: "Cultural industries are an important component of the national economy", and at the same time advocates making "cultural tourism an important service economic sector, developing significantly in quality and quantity, contributing positively to economic growth and job creation through the production of more and more diverse, high-quality cultural products and services, meeting the needs of creativity, enjoyment, and cultural consumption of domestic people and for export".
In addition, the Government also set a target that "cultural tourism accounts for 10-15% of the total revenue from tourists of about 18,000-19,000 million USD".
Implementing the above strategy, according to Director of the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism (Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism) Nguyen Trung Khanh, in recent years, our country has done a good job of preserving and promoting the value of cultural heritage. The tourism industry has developed cultural tourism products based on exploiting the inherent natural values of heritages such as visiting heritage sites and relics; learning and experiencing traditional culture, community cultural life, festival tourism, cuisine, spirituality, etc.
As a result, many types of intangible cultural heritage, especially traditional performing arts, have been restored and developed, contributing to attracting a large number of tourists, especially international visitors.
For example, "Hoi An Ancient Town Night" has recreated the original life of Hoi An people in the early 20th century with diverse and colorful cultural activities such as opera, village flags, calligraphy, card games, blindfolded pot smashing, Chinese chess... The unique tourism products, bearing the unique mark of Hoi An, have brought domestic and foreign tourists very interesting experiences. This is one of the important factors contributing to the success of Hoi An tourism in recent years.
Realizing the importance of tangible and intangible cultural heritages in developing the "smokeless industry", many localities have put forward specific strategies and plans to promote the value of these heritages.
For example, after the Trang An Scenic Landscape Complex was recognized by UNESCO as a World Cultural and Natural Heritage in 2014, Ninh Binh province has set out a clear strategy to promote the heritage value for sustainable tourism development. As a result, in 2022, the province welcomed more than 3.7 million visitors, of which one-third were international visitors. Recently, Ninh Binh was also listed in the top 10 friendliest destinations in the world.
Currently, cultural tourism products are contributing to enhancing Vietnam's tourism brand globally. At the World Travel Awards 2022, Vietnam was honored as "the world's leading heritage destination". This is the third time Vietnam has received this award (the previous two times were in 2019 and 2020). Hoi An City (Quang Nam) was honored for the third time in the category of "Asia's leading cultural urban destination"...
For Vietnam tourism to "take off"
It can be said that cultural tourism is becoming an attractive form of tourism, contributing to the development of Vietnam tourism towards sustainable green growth. This is also a factor that helps to enhance the brand, create a difference and contribute to improving the competitiveness of Vietnam tourism.
Art program "Hai Phong welcomes the new year 2023". Photo: Hoang Ngoc - VNAHowever, according to the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism, the development of cultural tourism is still facing many challenges, such as the legal corridor for the development of cultural industry products and cultural tourism is still incomplete; tourism promotion and advertising activities are still limited; human resources for cultural tourism do not meet the requirements...
Besides, in some localities, the issue of preserving and promoting heritages still faces many difficulties and challenges due to many reasons, notably the lack of financial resources and limited awareness among the people.
In that context, Director Nguyen Trung Khanh emphasized that the tourism industry needs to develop a synchronous policy to ensure harmony between preserving cultural heritage and developing tourism towards green and sustainable growth, especially encouraging the development of responsible tourism types associated with community culture.
On the other hand, according to experts, in order for Vietnamese tourism to "take off" on a cultural foundation, each region and locality needs to shape and build a cultural tourism brand, thereby building a national brand based on its inherent cultural potential and values, while promoting cultural tourism through cultural tourism events that combine music, cinema, cuisine, and Vietnamese cultural tourism festivals internationally; designing and building creative, unique and diverse cultural tourism products.
In addition, the tourism industry also needs to increase the application of information technology and digital technology in product development and promotion; promote and advertise markets for each type of cultural tourism product to enhance the image and positioning of Vietnam's cultural tourism brand in the region and the world.
It can be said that developing cultural tourism is in line with the potential and strengths of Vietnamese tourism as well as the general trend of humanity. This not only enhances the competitiveness of our country's tourism but also helps preserve unique and original cultural values, bringing sustainable livelihoods to the community./.
Kim Khuyen
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