In order to promote its tourism in key markets in the region and the world as a whole after a two-year hiatus due to the COVID-19 pandemic, in 2022, Da Nang effectively managed to restore the tourism industry, which is a non-smoke lucrative spearhead economic sector. Focus was placed on the promotion and development of local tourism products and services highly attractive to tourists, in a move to quickly recover international tourism.

2022 witnessed a boom in many activities and events with a joint mission of attracting visitors to Da Nang. Visitors are seen visiting the tourism product introduction booth of the Da Nang Tourism Promotion Centre at the event to welcome foreign press presstrip delegations. Photo: SONG KHUE

Organise many events, open new air routes

As expected by the municipal Department of Tourism, it is expected that in 2022, guests served by accommodation establishments would have reached 3.5 million, an increase of 2.9 times as compared to 2021, reaching 100% of the plan assigned by the Da Nang People's Committee.

Out of the 3.5 million tourists, foreigners are estimated at 400,000, 3.8 times higher than 2021, whilst domestic tourists are predicted at 3.1 million, up 2.9 times compared to the year-ago period.

Also by the end of this year, revenue from accommodation and travel would have reached VND 6,700 billion, up more than 2.6 times from last year.

As assessed by Director of the Da Nang Department of Tourism Truong Thi Hong Hanh, the highly-encouraging results mentioned above were mainly attributed to the close attention and instructions from the city leaders and great efforts exerted by agencies, localities and tourism businesses as well with the goal of strongly reviving the tourism industry.

After the national government's policy of completely opening up domestic and international tourism activities (March 15), Da Nang has implemented many strong promotion and communication activities targeting tourism products and services in services for tourist attraction. Prominent was the promotion of Da Nang tourism in South Korea, India, Thailand and Japan and resumption of international routes from Singapore, Thailand, South Korea, India and Taiwan (China).

Also, the city has done well in organising tourism promotion delegations to the UK, Germany and the Netherlands to introduce Da Nang’s image here and welcoming groups of famtrip and presstrip from South Korea, Thailand, Malaysia and India.

Many Da Nang-held, large-scale and unique activities and events have together brought new travel experiences to many tourists such as hot air balloon festival; Routes Asia 2022; Da Nang summer enjoyment festival 2022; Da Nang golf tourism festival 2022, focusing on Asian development golf tournament-BRG Open Golf Championship Da Nang 2022.

Also, the reopening of Son Tra night market, Helio night market and ‘Hon Viet (Vietnamese soul) live show made tourists highly excited.

Especially, despite many difficulties in the recovery of tourism, Da Nang has quickly opened new international routes, besides traditional ones connecting itself with other parts of the world such as South Korea, Bangkok (Thailand) Kuala Lumpur Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia), Singapore, Siem Reap (Cambodia).

Mr. Nguyen Son Thuy, Director of Duy Nhat Indochina Co., Ltd. highly appreciated the opening of new international routes, and notable among them was the one linking from Da Nang to Indian cities. The Indian market is highly expected to contribute to offsetting the limited number of international visitors from Northeast Asia.

Constantly enhance service quality

According to Ms. Truong Thi Hong Hanh, in 2023, the Da Nang tourism industry will continue to develop domestic tourism in tandem with attracting international visitors, with a focus on market segments with high-end customers who can spend much during their stay in Da Nang.

Also, the city will set a sight on developing tourism products and services that meet high-quality standards. Along with that, ensuring the quality of tourism human resources and increasing the number of visitors served by accommodation establishments by 15-20% in 2023 compared to 2022 will be among other tasks.

For the time being, some key markets of Da Nang such as South Korea and Japan have officially lifted the restriction on the entry of foreign tourists only by package tours and to allow individual travel, which creates an opportunity for Da Nang to connect with these traditional markets and attract more visitors.

With an effort to refresh products, constantly improve service quality and make innovations, Da Nang tourism is expected to continue to restore international tourist markets in 2023.

However, there are challenges in the coming time such as potential global recession, high inflation, tourists with tight spending, tense political situations in some countries, all of which may makes it difficult for Da Nang to promote its tourism in some international markets.

Based on this challenging fact, the tourism industry will focus on implementing tasks from the beginning of 2023, including the development of tourism infrastructure to create new tourism products and upgrading the existing tourist zones and spots.

The city will organize major events and festivals, step by step promote the growth of visitor source markets in Northeast Asia such as China, South Korea, Japan, Taiwan (China), Hong Kong (China) and Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia, India, Europe, the US and Australia.

Reporting by SONG KHUE – Translating by A.THU