Developing ecotourism in the provinces of the South Central Coast region by 2020

proposing solutions to protect ecotourism resources, planning solutions to develop ecotourism activities to ensure sustainable development and community benefits.

- Combine community ecotourism development programs with poverty reduction programs in remote areas, to attach community responsibilities and interests to ecotourism development.

- Cooperate with international organizations, institutes, universities, and travel companies to organize training courses for local people on practical skills in environmental protection, knowledge of ecotourism, ecotourism practice, and ecotourism explanation. Special attention is paid to the transfer of practical experience from models that have been successfully applied domestically and internationally on community ecotourism.

- Travel agencies and service providers need to research and survey local conditions and potentials to discuss and support the development of craft villages and traditional tourism products specific to each locality in order to enrich existing tourism products to meet tourists' needs.

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- Study the participation capacity and training requirements of local people, through existing operating conditions such as: tourism resources, agricultural production characteristics, traditional craft villages, on-site infrastructure facilities that can be exploited for ecotourism activities. On the basis of promoting the advantages of these resources along with the direct participation of local people to plan training skills to participate in exploiting community ecotourism development services.

3.3.2.4 Solutions to promote tourism activities:

* Objective: Introduce and provide information to domestic and foreign ecotourism markets to attract more and more ecotourism visitors to know and come to the Central Highlands. At the same time, bring ecotourism activities to integrate truly, deeply and effectively, with high competitiveness into ecotourism markets of countries in the region and the world.

* Implementation content:

- Research and implement the promotion of eco-tourism in a systematic and professional manner. Specific plans and campaigns need to be determined through research.

market. Promotional content focuses on ecotourism destinations, famous ecotourism tours, tourism products and brands according to each target market.

- The promotion strategy must be implemented synchronously through the coordination between the two provinces on a large scale, continuously, while focusing on strengthening the tourism brand of the region, specifically Mui Ne-Phan Thiet, Ninh Chu - Vinh Hy, Vinh Hao-Cu Lao Cau, Phu Quy island... taking the product development strategy as the content of the tourism promotion plan. Through promotion activities, it is necessary to create a prominent image of the most important values of the resources and eco-tourism of the Central Highlands.

- Organizing promotional activities needs to mobilize social resources, and organize implementation in a way that links, promotes cooperation and links between components such as the state, private sector, from senior management levels to tourism associations, businesses, local communities, etc.

- Under the leadership of the Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism of the two provinces, in combination with tourism and travel businesses, to strengthen domestic and international promotion, organize propaganda and promotion according to a unified, scientific, regular scenario and with mutual support between the provinces to create a brand for new eco-tourism destinations of the region and province.

- Organize annual fairs and exhibitions on ecotourism in the Central Highlands region in conjunction with festivals at the two centers of Phan Rang, Phan Thiet and some other tourist centers such as: Ho Chi Minh City, Nha Trang, Can Tho, Da Lat, Da Nang, Hue, Hanoi, etc. to regularly and promptly provide tourists with information on new ecotourism products and tourism linkage programs that tourists are interested in. At the same time, prepare concise and specific content to participate in domestic and international tourism fairs.

- Periodically organize tourism events in the Central Highlands region in the two localities of Ninh Thuan and Binh Thuan on a national festival scale, creating unique products for Binh Thuan and Ninh Thuan ecotourism that other places do not have, meeting the needs of tourists with increasingly high quality content.

- Create conditions for FAMTRIP delegations to conduct surveys for journalists, travel agencies, and related businesses to familiarize themselves with tourist routes and destinations.

DLST of Ninh Thuan and Binh Thuan. This is a very effective form of promotion that countries often apply.

* Conditions for implementation:

In terms of support policies and scientific and technical measures, the following main contents need to be implemented:

- Quickly apply the achievements of science and technology, especially information technology, must consider this as the fastest and most effective tool to promote and advertise to all customers. Besides, it is necessary to regularly monitor and update the developments in the world's economic and tourism economic fluctuations to promptly adjust and plan appropriate promotion plans to attract more and more tourists.

- In addition to the industry's budget used for general promotional activities, each province also needs to proactively allocate an appropriate portion of its budget to invest in promoting and advertising tourism in its locality, in which it is necessary to pay attention to the application of information technology in the form of e-commerce as an important content in the business operation program of units in the two provinces.

- There should be preferential policies to attract and call on all domestic and foreign components to participate in ecotourism development activities, and policies to encourage individuals and units to contribute to creating unique and novel ecotourism products, especially environmentally friendly products, clean and green tourism products, etc.

- Recommend to the government to expand the procedures for granting tourist visas to European countries, especially Eastern European countries, CIS, etc. to expand the source of tourists.

- On the basis of consolidating and expanding the existing tourism websites of the two provinces in the direction of introducing more diverse and in-depth topics on eco-tourism, especially investing heavily to promote the content of Cham Pa cultural heritage more widely and in more detail, along with programs and schedules of organizing these cultural events in each specific locality. At the same time, on the WEB pages of each locality, a discussion forum must be designed to consult customers' opinions and sharing, this is a useful source of information to help the tourism industry.

Provincial tourism has the conditions to supplement and perfect the product in order to continuously improve the quality and attractiveness of local tourism products.

3.3.2.5 Solutions to promote market development and build DLST brand:

* Objective: coordinate with tourism marketing and promotion, promote market development. Research the domestic and foreign tourist market, attract tourists according to market segments: purpose of arrival, ability to pay, prioritize targeting the ecotourism segment with pure tourism purposes, long-term stay and high payment level, towards building the ecotourism brand of the Central Highlands region to attract domestic and foreign tourists.

* Implementation content:

To achieve the goal, it is necessary to implement the following main contents:

- For the international ecotourism market, focus on developing distant markets with high spending capacity such as Russia, Ukraine, Australia, Japan, Germany, the US, etc. and nearby markets such as China, Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia, etc. It is necessary to determine specific strategies for ecotourism types according to each country group, in which special attention should be paid to recreational and leisure tourists combining sea-island ecotourism and exploration.

-For the domestic ecotourism market, focus on the high-end domestic tourist market segment that is clearly forming from Ho Chi Minh City, the Southeast region, and Hanoi. In addition, to promote the advantages of existing sea tourism, it is necessary to promote the development of domestic ecotourism customers in the form of resorts, entertainment, weekend breaks combined with ecotourism to explore nature and sea sports.

- Expanding cooperation with ASEAN countries: a great advantage is that it has signed cooperation agreements with most ASEAN countries in the field of tourism, thus creating conditions to promote tourism and eco-tourism linkage programs in transporting guests through connecting routes, designing new eco-tourism routes between ASEAN countries. In which, the DHCNTB region with its strengths in sea - island tourism, semi-desert sand dunes, tourism to wild natural areas, national parks, and nature reserves, will contribute to highlighting the attractiveness of eco-tourism tours to Vietnam in general and the DHCNTB region in particular.

- For the domestic market: there should be policies to encourage and create favorable conditions for people to participate in ecotourism activities such as subsidies for bus routes, boat trips to national parks, nature reserves, marine reserves, reducing fees or having policies for low-interest loans or loans with deferred payment but no interest for a certain period of time to encourage people to consume in tourism,...

3.3.2.6 Investment solutions and policy mechanisms for developing eco-tourism

* Objective: create a clear policy corridor to attract social capital to implement the service infrastructure investment program to develop eco-tourism.

* Implementation content:

+ Create an open environment to attract investors :

- First of all, it is necessary to promote investment in basic technical infrastructure for tourism using state budget capital, focusing on supporting investment in areas with potential to develop into large eco-tourism areas, national parks, and nature reserves to create a favorable environment to attract investors to continue to exploit remote areas with rich eco-tourism potential such as Phuoc Binh National Park, Nui Chua National Park, Nui Ong Nature Reserve, and Phu Quy Island Nature Reserve.

- In addition to the investment incentive policies prescribed by law (Decree 108/2006/ND-CP), provinces need to have more flexible incentive policies such as exemption of land rent, exemption or reduction of corporate income tax in the initial period, tax reduction for exploitation of local resources to serve the construction of tourist areas such as: exploitation of construction materials, exploitation of forests, exploitation of water, water surface, exploitation of craft villages, cultural and sports events, etc.

- Implement policies to encourage tax exemption for imported equipment, materials, machinery, and vehicles used to invest in new eco-tourism zones, promote preferential policies for on-site exports, facilitate payment and transfer of profits in foreign currency in tourism activities for enterprises with domestic and foreign capital.

+ Focus on mobilizing social capital sources to invest in developing eco-tourism:

- Encourage and call on economic sectors and all people to participate in investing and contributing to local eco-tourism programs and projects as a responsible contribution to the community.

- Increase budget capital, loans, mobilize funding from non-governmental organizations and other international organizations for biodiversity conservation and specific ecotourism resource development such as: forest protection, water and air protection, and to maintain and develop existing rare natural resources (rare animals and plants, unique ecosystems, biodiversity, etc.)

- There should be appropriate policies to educate and raise the sense of responsibility and role of local people and tourists in preserving and developing both natural and humanistic ecotourism resources. In addition, there should be measures to collect reasonable fees from individuals or tourism businesses to raise funds to preserve natural landscapes and historical and cultural relics in the region.

3.3.2.7 Solutions for comprehensive international integration expansion:

* Objective : Deep international economic integration will help exploit economic relations, bringing many benefits such as: taking advantage of advanced technology in tourism service engineering and management, expanding the market, attracting investment in the tourism sector, thereby creating conditions to shorten the backwardness gap compared to other countries.

* Implementation content :

- Strengthen and expand existing international cooperation relationships such as tourism groups of Thailand, Kazakhstan, Korea, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Russia, etc. Link to form tourism and eco-tourism areas with neighboring countries on the East-West corridor, or across Asia such as: Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, etc. Sign investment contracts, cooperation on technology transfer, training to promote the development of the eco-tourism industry.

- Tourism associations, management units and large travel businesses need to increase membership with international and national ecotourism and nature organizations such as TIES, subcommittees of UNWTO, WWF, Ecotours Aus, etc. to have the opportunity to access and learn from experiences from advanced management and application models of countries around the world on ecotourism.

- Signing cooperation contracts to transport guests between companies and tourism corporations of different countries, linking and supporting tourism promotion programs with international tourism companies.

- Through international tourism cooperation relationships at both macro and micro levels, it is necessary to strengthen information updating, investigation, and processing of information on the tourism and eco-tourism situation in the world as well as timely and complete updates from visitor markets and the needs to expand cooperation on eco-tourism with countries around the world.

* Implementation requirements :

- Integration needs to be strengthened and proactively implemented in selecting appropriate partners, organizations and the time of signing.

- Develop a plan to train additional human resources, especially focusing on training a team of managers and business people with in-depth knowledge of international law, foreign languages and professional tourism skills, quickly grasping changes in the international market to have flexible and timely responses and proposing exploitation plans according to cooperation agreements signed with foreign partners.

3.3.2.8 Solutions to strengthen management organization of eco-tourism activities:

*Objective: to help strengthen the capacity of provincial and regional state management of tourism, organize the development and management of eco-tourism activities in a synchronous manner, achieving high efficiency and following the general planning orientation of the region and the whole country.

*Implementation content:

+ Tourism development planning:

- Establishing investment planning for ecotourism development with the primary goal of optimally exploiting ecotourism resources: forest-sea tourism resource values, natural landscapes, biodiversity, tangible and intangible cultural values, especially traditional culture for ecotourism development.

- Based on the contents of the tourism development planning orientation to 2020 and the second vision to 2030 of the two provinces of Ninh Thuan and Binh Thuan, it is necessary to develop a detailed implementation plan for key ecotourism areas, investing in a reasonable and specific period. For the content of expanding cultural ecotourism, priority should be given to selecting investment projects.

Infrastructure, upgrading, restoration and renovation of historical relics, cultural heritages for Cham cultural regions, Ragley and K'Ho ethnic regions and other valuable human resources.

- Priority should be given to the selection of ecotourism projects that have been fully or basically planned, in Ninh Thuan: the ecotourism development project of Nui Chua - Vinh Hy National Park, in Binh Thuan: the ecotourism development project of Nui Ong - Thac Ba Nature Reserve; the ecotourism development project of Takou Nature Reserve; the ecotourism development project of Cu Lao Cau Marine Reserve. The above four projects are considered key to highlight the ecotourism development of the region in the coming years.

- In the process of organizing the implementation of the planning, it is necessary to organize the assignment and determine the responsibility of state management agencies in supporting the appraisal of feasible projects, in which it is necessary to clearly state the implementation progress, management mechanism and investment support policy. After appraisal, it is necessary to widely publicize the contents of the approved tourism development planning, creating conditions for tourism socialization right from the planning stage.

- In construction management, to limit negative impacts on the regional environment, it is necessary to develop and promulgate a system of standards on density, construction height, and environmental protection standards for investment projects during the licensing process as well as the construction and operation of the project. Special attention should be paid to projects in the coastal area of Ninh Chu-Vinh Hy, the Mui Ne-Hoa Thang area, and in other sensitive ecological areas.

+ Strengthen innovation to perfect the tourism management system :

- Build and increase the operational capacity of tourism management departments under the Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism in the two provinces to match the operational requirements (it is possible to form a tourism development management department). In particular, the tourism associations of the two provinces need to improve their management capacity, including increasing human resources, organizing the apparatus, creating financial resources, building specific and independent organizational and operational regulations so that this agency can truly be a place to gather and represent the interests of local tourism businesses. In the future, it is possible to establish a joint tourism association for the two provinces to create closer links in tourism management and operation.

Developing ecotourism in the provinces of the South Central Coast region by 2020 - 19

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