General Assessment of Tourism Service Export Activities in Vietnam

Phong Nha – Ke Bang World Nature Reserve; Visit, learn and research the biodiversity of Eastern Truong Son.

- South Central Coast: Sea and island ecotourism. Visit and experience the seascapes and marine ecosystems: sand dunes, coral reefs, seagrass beds.

- Central Highlands: Ecotourism - experience the landscape of the red basalt plateau. Visit and learn about the ecosystems of the Khop forest (broad-leaved, deciduous forest). Ecotourism is associated with community tourism and visiting ethnic villages.

- Southeast region: River ecotourism. Visit and learn about the ecosystem along the Saigon River and the mangrove ecosystem.

Maybe you are interested!

- Mekong Delta: Ecotourism - wetland ecosystem. Visit and learn about the inland wetland ecosystem with the Mekong Delta canal system; Visit and learn about the coastal mangrove ecosystem.

Although developing ecotourism is a strategic orientation in Vietnam's tourism development, up to now the development of this type of tourism still has many limitations and shortcomings. Many travel agencies and localities have made efforts in building plans for ecotourism development, building tours, ecotourism areas, ecotourism development models with community participation... however, these activities are still in small and simple forms and scales. There is a lack of investment in infrastructure, technical facilities specific to ecotourism development or they are built haphazardly, not following the principles of ecotourism development, causing damage to the environmental landscape. Environmental education and interpretation centers for both tourists and local residents in national parks and conservation areas are still very limited.

Shopping tourism

In developed countries, tourism and shopping are a two-way relationship. Shopping stimulates tourism and tourism creates conditions for shopping to grow. Therefore, in addition to improving services in tourist areas, the government also invests in building many large shopping areas, creating highlights to attract tourists. Currently in the region, Thailand is the most successful country in taking advantage of tourism and promoting activities.

shopping. According to the assessment, the tourism model combined with shopping will help increase revenue for both the tourism and trade industries, but in the past, international tourists to Vietnam spent only 10 - 14% on shopping, while in Thailand, this figure was up to 51%. This type of tourism service brings in a significant source of revenue when in Vietnam, the structure of tourists spending on shopping activities in 2019 accounted for 55.85%, opening up opportunities to develop this type of product and service.

Therefore, since 2010, Vietnam tourism has shifted its approach to shopping tourism. Through discount sales campaigns for tourists, it is both to stimulate shopping and increase revenue, and to gradually shift to collecting money from tourists mainly through sales, rather than transportation fees, accommodation fees or entrance tickets. The General Department of Tourism coordinates with the Trade Promotion Agency (Ministry of Industry and Trade) to implement discount sales campaigns in a number of major cities, tourist centers of our country such as Hanoi, Da Nang and Ho Chi Minh City, through tourism stimulus programs to attract domestic and foreign tourists. The purpose of the programs and campaigns is to attract tourists and consume Vietnamese goods and products.

In Vietnam, there have also appeared areas developing shopping services for tourists with famous locations such as Dong Xuan market, night market, Tong Duy Tan food street (Hanoi), Hoi An ancient town (Quang Nam), Ben Thanh market, Bui Vien, Chinatown (HCMC)... However, at tourist destinations in many other provinces and cities, the creation of concentrated shopping spaces with diverse connections of goods has not yet been focused on fully exploiting the spending potential of tourists.

The average personal spending of an international tourist ranges from 50 to 90 USD/day. In particular, for visitors from Western European countries, this spending level can reach 80 to 90 USD/day. This spending level has not shown clear growth compared to the past few years, because the shopping system has not been invested in synchronously in terms of quality and quantity. Souvenir products have not been improved in terms of design and value to meet the aesthetic and quality needs of high-class international visitors. Unhealthy competition unifies the price and quality of goods

in shopping at tourist attractions; or the situation of counterfeit goods is quite common in Vietnam, causing tourists to lose confidence.

In general, Vietnam's tourism products are not rich, mainly the tours only exploit the potential of natural conditions, have not developed many other types of services to meet the entertainment needs of international tourists, leading to low spending power of tourists. Even in Ha Long - a world natural heritage known internationally, the time tourists stay is only 1 - 2 days, because there is only a program to visit the bay by boat. Most of Vietnam's tourism products only take advantage of available natural resources, still do not focus and lack orientation on other typical tourism products to suit markets with high spending power such as shopping tourism, culinary tourism, craft village tourism... Entertainment, recreation and shopping areas at tourist destinations are still lacking and weak. After a day of sightseeing, international tourists cannot find a place to relax and shop in the evening, it can be said that this is the overall picture of Vietnam's tourism today.

2.3 General assessment of tourism service export activities in Vietnam

2.3.1 Achievements in service export activities

Exporting tourism services brings revenue to the economy in general and the service industry in particular, earning foreign currency.

Tourism revenue, revenue from selling goods to serve tourists, social income from tourism and contributions to the state budget have high growth rates, not inferior to the leading economic sectors of the country. Selling goods to serve international tourists has contributed to the overall revenue of the tourism industry, contributing to increasing foreign currency for import and investment activities, and at the same time creating jobs for tens of thousands of direct sales workers and tens of thousands of other indirect workers, partly solving the problem of unemployment and idle workers in our country.

According to the report of the General Department of Tourism in 2019, Total revenue from tourists reached 755 trillion VND (equivalent to 32.8 billion USD), of which: Total revenue from international tourism was 421 trillion VND, accounting for 55.7%, equivalent to 18.3 billion USD of export value from tourism. With the rapid growth of international tourists with 18 million arrivals, tourism

bringing in increasingly large revenues for the country's economy. The direct contribution of tourism accounts for an increasingly high proportion of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP): from 6.3% in 2015 to 9.2% in 2019, an increase of 2.9%.

Orientation for developing effective tourism services

- MICE tourism: Vietnam's tourism development strategy to 2030 sets the goal of "Vietnam becoming an attractive destination, striving to be among the top three countries in tourism development in Southeast Asia and the top 50 countries in tourism competitiveness in the world, in which all 14 tourism competitiveness criteria have increased, in line with the requirements of sustainable development". The strategy focuses on developing MICE, sports, and health care tourism to attract both international and domestic tourist markets. Domestic destinations developing MICE tourism are clearly stated, including: Hanoi, Quang Ninh, Da Nang, Khanh Hoa and Ho Chi Minh City.

- Craft village tourism: Through activities of selling goods to serve international tourists such as souvenirs, gifts... has changed the face of craft villages, increased income, improved living standards for a part of the people. Help orient and restructure activities outside of tourism tours, revive some traditional handicrafts. The strong export of traditional handicrafts has contributed to shifting the economic structure in rural areas, thereby contributing to the development of local, industry and regional socio-economic life. In addition, the restoration, preservation, development and restructuring of craft village tourism has helped revive some traditional handicrafts, increase income, stabilize people's lives and the development of the tourism industry.

- Ecotourism: is a fairly new type of tourism in our country, the service industry is exploiting the potential of ecotourism in Vietnam, in some places ecotourism activities have also been formed in the form of exploiting the potential of different natural tourism resources such as sightseeing and research tourism in some national parks (Cat Ba, Cuc Phuong, Ba Be, Nam Cat Tien, Tam Nong, U Minh ...); adventure tourism, research in high mountainous areas such as Fansipan; sightseeing tourism in gardens, rivers of the Mekong Delta; scuba diving tourism (Ha Long - Cat Ba, Nha Trang), cave exploration (Phong Nha) ...

Stimulate shopping activities for tourists

Many big cities and some tourist centers have formed networks and specialized stores that sell goods to serve international tourists with high efficiency. Commercial centers have been built and developed. Vietnam is trying to gradually achieve results like Thailand or Singapore to earn foreign currency from tourists' shopping activities. Besides, building tourist shopping streets is also one of the activities to stimulate the purchase of local products, promoting the traditional image of the country.

Vietnam tourism awards achieved

In 2019, Vietnam's tourism industry achieved prestigious awards after welcoming a record 18 million international tourists, marking the success of Vietnam's tourism industry:

- World's Leading Heritage Destination (first time awarded by World Travel Awards);

- World's best golf destination (awarded for the first time by World golf Awards);

- Asia's leading destination (2nd consecutive time awarded by World Travel Awards);

- Asia's leading cultural destination (2nd consecutive time awarded by World Travel Awards);

- Asia's leading culinary destination (awarded for the first time by World Travel Awards);

2.3.2 Difficulties still exist in tourism service export activities

The decline in tourist numbers due to the Covid 19 epidemic

International tourism, the main source of revenue for the tourism industry, has declined sharply over the past year. The number of flights in October 2020 decreased by 80% compared to the same period last year. Hotel room occupancy rate also reached only 30%. 9 5% of international travel businesses were forced to stop operating, many hotels closed, and room occupancy rate of many accommodation establishments in major cities and tourist areas reached only 10 - 15%. In addition, 26,721 tour guides, with 16,965 also switched to domestic guiding or changed careers.

According to the General Statistics Office, the fact that foreign tourists cannot come to Vietnam has a huge impact on tourism revenue and the economy, because this group spends much more than domestic tourists. In 2019, the tourism industry accounted for 12% of the country's GDP, the number of international tourists only accounted for 17% but spent more than half: on average, each foreign tourist spent 673 USD, while domestic tourists spent only 61 USD. Total tourism revenue reached 312 trillion VND, down 58.7% - a decrease equivalent to 19 billion USD. About 40-60% of workers lost their jobs or had their working days cut.

The impact of Covid 19 on the tourism industry is multidimensional and affects 3 trends.

First, the decline in Chinese tourists. China is the largest tourist market for Vietnam tourism. In 2019, Vietnam welcomed 18 million international visitors, of which Chinese tourists accounted for more than 5.8 million, about 32% of the total number of tourists to Vietnam. The number of Chinese tourists to Vietnam has decreased sharply, and freight transport activities related to China will also decrease due to lower Chinese consumer demand and limited production activities.

Second, the decline in international visitors in Asia and Southeast Asia, including Vietnam. Because Asia is a region with a higher risk of infection than other tourist destinations. Southeast Asia, which has had an impressive CAGR (Compounded Annual Growth Rate) in the 10 years since the Asian financial crisis (2009-2019), will face a relatively large decline in international visitors.

Third, domestic tourism demand has also dropped sharply. As most people tend to avoid crowded places such as airports, train stations, bus stations, restaurants, and entertainment areas. The postponement and cancellation of meetings and conferences to prevent the spread of the disease has led to a decrease in the number of MICE tourists, corporate tourists, groups of tourists, business travelers, and even individual tourists.

The World Tourism Organization predicts that it will take 3-4 years for international tourism to recover. Meanwhile, the COVID-19 pandemic has eroded the capacity of businesses, most tourism businesses are facing financial difficulties to restore operations, many businesses have transferred or changed their business direction; workers' income has decreased, the psychology of limiting spending has greatly affected tourism consumption of the majority of people, market demand has decreased; many support policies, although there are policies, have not reached businesses and workers in the tourism industry.

Planning, regeneration and maintenance of natural resources still face many shortcomings.

The exploitation planning is not yet commensurate with the existing potential. Tourism exploitation lacks strategic vision and strict management by authorities, causing damage, wear and tear, and depletion to nature. Environmental pollution has been a hot issue in recent times. Tourism exploitation is one-way, only knowing how to take advantage and exploit thoroughly but not regenerating, protecting, and restoring the natural environment.

Besides, people's awareness of environmental protection is still low, they do not care about the common interests of the community, so they have not maximized the existing tourism resources (such as throwing garbage in beaches, international tourism events, etc.)

International travel businesses are not operating effectively and are not competitive with multinational travel businesses.

Vietnam's international travel businesses still lack strategy in their operations. Marketing and advertising of Vietnam's image in the world tourism market is still lacking.is an issue that needs attention. Building a long-term and suitable marketing strategysuitable for international tourists to always consider Vietnam as an attractive destination in their plans.Their vacation was a challenge not easy to accomplish.

Businesses lack close connection and coordination with each other to form a service supply chain, and have not applied much technology to service activities. Customers always need to find businesses with ecosystems and supply chains.

services to meet the demand. However, Vietnam does not have many businesses operating in the supply chain, so it lacks competitiveness with multinational travel companies and foreign-invested travel companies.

Although the human resources working in the tourism service industry are large, in terms ofProfessional level is not high, not meeting the timely requirements of international touristsIn addition, the international language communication of tour guides is not yetconvey all messages about scenic spots, history - culture ...

Tourism products and types of tourism have not met the expectations of international tourists when coming to Vietnam.

The quality of many products and services is still low compared to the international level and lacks professionalism and industrial style in performing services. Service prices are not highly competitive and cannot satisfy the service requirements of increasingly diverse or high-class customers.

Shopping tourism is a growing trend in service export activities.tourism. However, the sales locations are still lacking in concentration and do not have a specific system.Single family business that does not specialize in selling products forinternational touristsBusiness items that have not attracted international touristsFine art products such as lacquerware or silk scarves are poor in ideas and lack of attention.creativity. Not only that, some stores also import goods that are not of Vietnamese origin.makes international customers lack confidence in the product and quality. Product packagingProducts such as coffee, pepper, etc. do not have complete product information.Products and labels are still monotonous and unprofessional.

Ecotourism in Vietnam is currently in its early stages of development. Research, basic investigation and planning for ecotourism development are still limited. Many localities and travel companies have tried to build a number of programs and tourism routes with the nuances of ecotourism, but the scale and form are still monotonous and vague, the products and market targets are still unclear, so they are less likely to attract visitors. On the other hand, professional training for the team of management and operation staff, ecotourism guides has not yet met the development needs.

Comment