Da Nang Department of Tourism has worked with its counterparts in Quang Binh, Thua Thien- Hue and Quang Nam provinces to organize a webinar to promote their localities as places to visit for South Korean travellers. The virtual event has attracted about 150 invited guests, including about 80 travel agencies and their partners in South Korea.

The decision of organizing this online event came after a joint action plan between Da Nang and Quang Nam Province on welcoming back international tourists had been announced in line with the guidance from the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism. Many South Korean travel agencies expressed their desire to bring visitors from their country to Viet Nam on charter flights under self-contained package tours during the peak tourist season at the end of 2021 and New Year 2022.

The online event aimed to introduce the tourism policy and tour packages in the four Vietnamese localities for South Korean tourists and great potential for the development of the tourism industry in both South Korea and Viet Nam.

Mr Nguyen Xuan Binh, the Deputy Director of Da Nang Department of Tourism said that Vietnam is actively promoting international tourism for it while ensuring the safe reopening of tourist destinations in the country. Therefore, Viet Nam’s National Government has allowed 5 localities namely Da Nang, Kien Giang, Khanh Hoa, Quang Nam and Quang Ninh to pilot welcoming back international guests in 3 phases, starting from November 2021. Successful pilot phases of welcoming foreign visitors will be crucial to Viet Nam to decide to fully open to them from June 2022. Being one of the pioneer localities of Viet Nam to give recommendations on restoring international tourism activity to the national government, Da Nang has made thorough preparation for welcoming back international tourists safely with a focus on making sure that all of local tourism workers are fully vaccinated within November.

Mr Nguyen Vu Tung, Vietnamese Ambassador to the Republic of Korea, said that South Korea is one of the few countries in the world to successfully achieve both of the dual missions of effectively control the spread of COVID-19 and driving economic growth. Till date, more than 80% of the South Korean population has been fully vaccinated against COVID-19. Since November, life in South Korea has returned to normal in the harmonious combination of fighting the pandemic and promoting economic development. The country still allows international and domestic flights to operate and adopts flexible quarantine rules for its arrivals. It allows quarantine-free entry for fully-vaccinated travellers or those who have proof of a negative COVID-19 PCR test taken within 72 hours of their departing. Many South Korean nationals are looking forward to traveling to Da Nang in the near future.

Reporting by THU HA – translating by H.L