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Scatter Plot of Moran's I Local Index of Tourism Revenue in the North Central and South Central Coast Regions in 2012 and 2019

tourism information sector; investment and product development as well as promotion of local products; tourism training and development.



(Source: Data from the General Statistics Office of Vietnam processed by Stata)

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Figure 3.12. Scatter plot of local Moran's I index on tourism revenue in the North Central and South Central Coast regions in 2012 and 2019

Meanwhile, Quang Binh and the remaining localities in the North Central and South Central Coast regions (except Khanh Hoa) are positioned in the LL quadrant (low - low), meaning that the locality has low tourism revenue and neighboring localities are also low during the period 2012 - 2019. Thus, the local and regional linkages in tourism development of these localities (including Quang Binh) are very low, not creating a spillover effect to promote tourism revenue growth for the whole region. This result coincides with the analysis as presented in the previous section, adding further evidence to the conclusion that the overlap in products and the application of quite similar development models is a common situation in many localities in the Central region, which shows the division and fragmentation in tourism development, leading to resources not being used effectively.

In summary, regional connectivity in tourism development in the Central region (including the North Central and South Central Coast regions) focuses on the Thua Thien Hue - Da Nang - Quang Nam tourism cluster. This implies an important policy for Quang Binh province, which is to identify a priority cluster with the three localities of Thua Thien Hue - Da Nang - Quang Nam on the basis of maximizing the potential and advantages of Phong Nha - Ke Bang National Park Heritage to develop inter-local tours according to the program "Central Heritage Road", contributing to creating the difference and uniqueness of regional tourism products, moving towards building the tourism brand of this cluster.

3.4.2. Impact of regional connectivity on the performance of tourism businesses and service establishments in Quang Binh province

In order to achieve the research objective, in this section, the thesis evaluates the impact of regional connectivity on the performance of tourism service businesses and establishments in Quang Binh province (hereinafter referred to as enterprises), operating in 04 main areas, including: travel, accommodation, transportation and restaurants. The method used in this study is descriptive statistics based on survey data sources of tourism service businesses and units. There are 6 criteria used to evaluate the impact of participating in regional connectivity on the performance of enterprises, including: 1) Sharing knowledge, information and resources; 2) reducing promotion and advertising costs; 3) improving competitiveness; 4) expanding business scale; 5) Developing new products; 6) Increasing revenue and profit. The opinions were evaluated using a 5-point Likert scale, where 1 represents complete disagreement and 5 represents complete agreement.



(Source: Business survey data)


Figure 3.13. Business assessment of the impact of regional connectivity on the performance of tourism service businesses in Quang Binh province

The statistical results show that the evaluation opinions of enterprises have noted some benefits when participating in regional connection activities, which is to help enterprises have the opportunity to share knowledge, exchange information and resources to carry out business activities. This is demonstrated through the evaluation score of the criterion "Sharing knowledge, information and resources" reaching over 4 points, in which the evaluation score of travel enterprises is 4.26 points; of accommodation establishments (4.22 points); of restaurant service establishments is 4.18 points and of transport units is 3.16 points. In addition, the criterion "Reducing promotion and advertising costs" is also positively evaluated by enterprises, with an evaluation score of over 4 points, meaning that participating in regional connection activities has helped enterprises save on promotion and advertising costs for tourism products.

However, the remaining 4 criteria were not highly rated by businesses, which are criteria related to improving competitiveness; expanding the scale of operations; developing new products, especially increasing revenue and profit for businesses. The average score of these criteria was just below 3.5 points, except for the score of travel businesses for the criterion "Increasing revenue and profit" which reached 4.08 points.

Thus, in general, participation in regional connectivity activities in tourism development has only brought about some initial results, mainly creating conditions for businesses to meet, share experiences, exchange information and cooperate in introducing and promoting tourism products and services. This result once again affirms that the current situation of cooperation between businesses in Quang Binh province and businesses and partners outside Quang Binh province has mostly stopped at the level of exchanging information, sharing and guiding tourists to use some basic services in tours and tourist routes to Quang Binh such as: sightseeing, accommodation, food and beverage and transportation. Meanwhile, the linkage in investment, in human resource training and product and service development or linkage at the level of strategic partners, joint ventures and associations has not been implemented extensively and widely. On the other hand, the scope of impact of regional connectivity is quite narrow, limited only to the tourism sector. Many businesses operating in the fields of accommodation, food services, and passenger transport have not yet received the benefits from participating in regional connectivity, the direct cause of which is that the level of participation of these businesses is not high, especially small-scale businesses and establishments.

3.5. Assessment of sustainability in tourism development in Quang Binh province


As presented in chapter 1, the research question raised in this thesis is whether tourism development results in Quang Binh province are achieved in a sustainable manner based on the implementation of policies and programs for regional cooperation and connectivity? To answer this important question, the author continues to analyze and evaluate the sustainability of tourism development in Quang Binh province based on a number of economic, social and environmental indicators such as tourism industry income, the proportion and contribution of tourism industry to GRDP, employment opportunities for local people, and a number of issues related to the ecological environment. The data sources included in the analysis include both secondary and primary data.


(Source: General Statistics Office, Vietnam)

Figure 3.14. Average GRDP per capita of provinces and cities in the Central region in 2018


Regarding economy: According to the report of the Quang Binh Statistics Office, the gross regional domestic product (GRDP) in 2019 at current prices reached 39,155.4 billion VND, an increase of 7.34% compared to 2018 (at 2010 comparative prices); GRDP per capita reached 43.67 million VND. Compared with localities in the Central Highlands and Central Highlands, the per capita income of Quang Binh province ranked 13th out of 14 provinces and cities (higher than Nghe An); lower than the average income of the Central Highlands and Central Highlands and other economic regions in the country; ranked 50th out of 63 provinces and cities in terms of GRDP per capita. This reflects that Quang Binh is still a poor province, the economic life of most people still faces many difficulties, posing many significant challenges for local authorities.

Although the service sector accounted for 54.46% of the province's GRDP in 2019 at current prices and achieved high growth rates for many years, the contribution of the tourism industry to the GRDP of Quang Binh province is still low. Summary and calculation

Calculations from the statistical yearbook data show that the tourism revenue/GRDP ratio of Quang Binh province is about 11 - 14% in the period 2015 - 2019. However, when separating the GRDP of accommodation and catering services (including services not related to tourism), the contribution to the total GRDP of Quang Binh province is less than 5%; meanwhile, the direct contribution rate of the tourism industry to the country's GDP in the year is 9% (Appendix 33) .


(Source: Calculation from Quang Binh Province Statistical Yearbook)

Figure 3.15. Contribution of tourism industry to GRDP of Quang Binh province

Obviously, the current development of tourism in Quang Binh province is still not commensurate with the potential and advantages of tourism resources, the spread and ability to create effects on the economic growth of Quang Binh province is still low. If citing the content of the tourism development plan of Quang Binh province to 2020 and vision to 2025, the development of tourism in Quang Binh province has not achieved the set goals. According to the planning content, the target by 2020, the contribution of tourism to the province's GRDP is 2%. This also poses many significant challenges for the local government of Quang Binh province when tourism is identified as a key economic sector.

Regarding society: Although the contribution of the tourism industry to the economic growth of Quang Binh is not much, it can be said that the spillover effect on the social community is remarkable. First of all, the tourism industry has created many jobs for local people, with about 6,000 direct workers and nearly 12,000 indirect workers (Report of the Department of Tourism, 2019). A 2019 report by the World Bank on the update of Vietnam's economic development (special topic: Vietnam's tourism development) said that poor localities all have quite spectacular tourism growth rates, which shows that tourism is an important economic sector that creates conditions for

Income distribution from rich to poor areas in Vietnam, including Quang Binh province (Appendix 34) . Compared to localities classified in the group with low household income, Quang Binh has a relatively high tourism growth rate, which will contribute significantly to the local poverty reduction process.

In particular, the impact of tourism on a part of the rural population in Quang Binh has become clear, bringing many practical benefits and contributing to local poverty reduction efforts. This can be demonstrated through the development of the community tourism model in the buffer zone of PNKB National Park, which is mainly concentrated in Bo Trach district, Quang Binh province. According to statistics in 2019, in Bo Trach district, there are 122 accommodation service businesses in the homestay and farmstay models. Of which, many models have developed successfully, attracting hundreds of visitors every day, mostly foreign tourists such as: Chay Lap Farmstay, Phong Nha Farmstay, Pepper House Homestay, Ho Khanh Homestay, Jungle Boss Homestay. In addition to the Homestay and Farmstay models, there are also other tourism product and service business models such as: food and beverage services, mountain bike rental, outdoor activities, participating in agricultural production activities with local people. Although the community tourism model has only recently developed and is still small in scale, this type of tourism has contributed significantly to creating jobs and increasing income for local residents, most of whom are low-skilled workers in rural areas.


(Source: Survey data of homestay service business households in 2019)

Figure 3.16. Social impacts of community tourism model in the buffer zone of PNKB National Park

The results of the interview survey of homestay business households show that the majority of household members participating in homestay community tourism are from 2 to 3 members.

At the same time, there are also 4-5 family workers working in community tourism, with main jobs such as: management, service staff, guides, providing experience services and transportation (see Appendix 35) . Furthermore, the benefits of the community tourism model are highly appreciated by these households in some other social aspects such as people having the opportunity to learn foreign languages ​​to serve international tourists; infrastructure, roads, clean water systems, electricity have been somewhat improved, including people's houses have been renovated and upgraded to improve service quality.

However, the impact of community tourism on the social aspect also has some negative issues, in which the majority of people participating in the interview said that the development of community tourism has increased the cost of living compared to before; the appearance of other cultures leads to changes in the community's lifestyle, which is also much different from the previous indigenous lifestyle; the risk of division in the community due to competition and overlapping ideas about how to do community tourism. In particular, the most important issue is that the opportunity for the poor to participate in this type of tourism is still limited, mostly because the scale of community tourism business is not large enough, the education level and understanding of the majority of people in rural areas is still quite limited.

Regarding the environment: In general, tourism products in Quang Binh province currently largely rely on the exploitation of natural resources, concentrated in the PNKB National Park area - a World Natural Heritage. Therefore, in addition to the goal of economic growth of the tourism industry, the issue of preserving the natural ecological environment is also of great concern.

The results of the interview survey show that at tourist destinations, there have been signs of local environmental pollution due to the emission of post-consumer standards by tourists that have not been collected and treated promptly, especially the discharge from the system of restaurants and accommodation facilities in the tourist centers of Dong Hoi city and Phong Nha - Ke Bang area. However, if compared with major tourist centers in the region and the whole country, the system of tourist routes, as well as the density of accommodation facilities and food services serving tourists in Quang Binh province is not large enough, so the negative impact of tourism activities on the environment at the destinations has not occurred on a large scale.

(Source: 2019 tourist survey data)

Figure 3.17. Tourists' perceptions of the environment at tourist attractions in Quang Binh province

The most concerning issue at present in terms of the natural environment is the preservation of the value of the PNKB National Park World Natural Heritage. As presented in the previous section, tourism products in the PNKB National Park area are mostly classified as mass tourism products such as Phong Nha Cave, Thien Duong Cave, Mooc Spring, Chay River - Dark Cave. These are tourism products with low capacity, in addition, they are products chosen by domestic tourists when visiting Quang Binh, which leads to overload during peak season and also means impact on the ecological environment of the PNKB National Park World Natural Heritage.

Thus, Quang Binh tourism is still in the development stage, the industry's influence on the local socio-economy is not large enough. From this reality, the policies of regional cooperation and connectivity in tourism development in Quang Binh province mainly focus on achieving the quantitative growth target of the tourism industry, while not paying attention to qualitative growth, or in other words, not linked to the goal of sustainable tourism development.

3.6. Analysis of factors affecting regional connectivity in tourism development in Quang Binh province

3.6.1. Positive factors creating opportunities for regional connectivity in tourism development in Quang Binh province

Based on the results of in-depth interviews and secondary data collection, this study identifies and summarizes a number of factors that have been creating opportunities for

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