Some solutions to develop Vietnam tourism

Con Son has mossy rocks. Sitting on the rocks feels like sitting on a soft cushion.

In terms of travel purposes, ancient people set out to broaden their horizons, to admire beauty, to show respect to ancestors and gods... only a few set out for the purpose of relaxation or medical treatment...

The nascent tourism industry only really appeared during the French colonial period in our country. When coming to Vietnam, the French, in order to serve their own needs and the needs of the upper class, built a number of resorts here. The style of tourism also changed to the Western style of tourism, that is, tourism with more of a resort nature. If in the past, visiting rugged mountainous areas was considered an elegant pleasure, the French preferred plateaus with temperate climates and beaches that were convenient for swimming. Some places such as Da Lat, Ba Na-Nui Chua, Nha Trang, Sam Son, Cua Lo... were invested into popular tourist areas at that time.

During the two resistance wars against French colonialism and American imperialism, the war conditions did not have many favorable conditions for tourism development. Tourism activities mainly met the requirements of serving delegations of the Party and the State, tourists entering our country according to the Protocols. In such very difficult conditions, some tourist facilities in Hanoi, Hai Phong, Quang Ninh, Tam Dao, Hoa Binh, Thanh Hoa, Nghe An were still invested in and developed with a lot of efforts from those working in tourism.

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After the complete liberation of the South and the reunification of the country, tourism activities gradually spread to all regions of the country. In peaceful conditions, our country has the conditions to restore and rebuild tourism facilities and gradually expand and build many new facilities from Hue, Da Nang, Binh Duong, etc.

Destined to Nha Trang, Lam Dong, Ho Chi Minh City, Vung Tau, Can Tho. The tourism economy was also gradually built, the State tourism enterprises were under the General Department of Tourism and the People's Committees of provinces, cities and special zones. In June 1978, the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism was established under the Government Council, marking a new step in the development of tourism. However, during this time, our country was still poor and managed under a subsidy regime, so tourism was not yet a popular demand. The main activities were combined tourism or resort tours according to the regime, the contribution of the tourism industry to the socio-economy was limited.

Since the country opened up, tourism has been truly facilitated to develop. People's living standards have improved day by day, and tourism has become more popular. The opening up of cooperation and integration with the world has made the number of international tourists to Vietnam increase every year, and the role of tourism in the economy has increased day by day. In addition, the organization of tourism management has also been increasingly improved, the tourism development policy mechanism has been gradually formed, institutionalized by legal documents, creating an environment for tourism development, and improving management effectiveness. It can be said that Vietnam's tourism has never developed as strongly as it does now and will have the opportunity to develop even more strongly when the economy is on the rise and continues to deeply integrate into the world economy.

1.2 Vietnam's tourism resources

Vietnam is considered a country rich in tourism resources, which is the basic condition and premise for developing domestic tourism. With its geographical location, climate and complex geological structure, Vietnam has a rich source of natural tourism resources. 4000 years of building and defending the country associated with the brilliant Red River civilization, Vietnam's human tourism resources are also very rich, imbued with national identity. In general, tourism resources

Vietnam is evenly distributed throughout the country, concentrated in clusters near large urban areas and important traffic routes, convenient for organizing exploitation and forming complementary tourist routes between regions.

1.2.1 Natural tourism resources

Regarding natural tourism resources, we have special advantages in terms of geographical location, located in the center of Southeast Asia, Vietnam's territory is both connected to the mainland and connected to the ocean, with a favorable international exchange position by sea, river, rail, road and air. Geographical location is an important premise in the development of international tourism.

The diverse characteristics of the terrain structure of the sea and islands, plains, highlands and mountains have created for Vietnam's territory a diversity and richness of landscapes and unique ecosystems, especially the ecosystems of sea and islands, lakes, forests, caves, etc.

Vietnam is the country with the 27th longest coastline among 156 countries bordering the sea in the world. Vietnam's coastline stretches over 360km2 across 15 latitudes with 125 beaches with favorable conditions for resort activities, swimming, entertainment and recreation such as Tra Co, Sam Son, Cua Lo, Thuan An, Lang Co, Non Nuoc, Phan Rang, Long Thiet, Dong Hai, Vung Tau, Ha Tien... The coastal morphology creates many beautiful bays with great potential for tourism development such as Ha Long Bay, Van Phong Bay, Cam Ranh Bay... In which Ha Long Bay has been recognized twice as a world cultural heritage. In a total of 2700 large and small islands along the coast, many islands such as: Cai Hau, Cat Ba, Tuan Chau, Cu Lao Cham, Phu Qui, Con Dao, Con Lon... with rich ecosystems and beautiful landscapes are places with conditions to form attractive tourist areas and destinations.

With about 50,000 km2 of Karst terrain, Vietnam is a country with great potential for cave and rapid tourism, of which 200 caves have been developed.

Currently, a typical example is Phong Nha Cave with an exploited length of 8km2 which has been recognized as a world natural heritage.

Our country's mineral water resources are abundant and have great significance for tourism development. Up to now, we have discovered about 400 natural mineral water sources with temperatures ranging from 27 to 105 0 C. The chemical composition of mineral water is very diverse, from Sodium Bicarbonate to Sodium Chloride with high mineralization, which is valuable for resort tourism and medical treatment.

Vietnam has a diverse flora and fauna-forest ecosystem. Up to now, the country has 107 special-use forests, including 16 national forests, 55 nature reserves and 43 cultural-historical-environmental forests with a total forest area of 2,092,466 hectares. This is a valuable ecotourism resource, preserving about 12,000 species of plants and about 7,000 species of animals with many endemic and rare breeds.

1.2.2 Human tourism resources

We have about 40,000 historical relics, of which 2,500 are classified by the state. Typical examples are the Hue Monuments Complex (Thua Thien-Hue Province), Hoi An Ancient Town, and My Son Relics (Quang Nam) which have been recognized by UNESCO as world cultural heritages.

Besides the relics, Vietnamese culture is also enriched by a diverse treasure of arts such as cheo, tuong, cai luong, puppetry, quan ho singing, xoan singing, gheo singing, ly melodies, and cau ho... in which Hue royal court music and Central Highlands gongs are recognized by UNESCO as two world cultural heritages.

Historical, cultural, revolutionary relics, many traditional crafts with unique skills, many festivals associated with the activities, culture, and unique folk arts of the community of 54 ethnic groups with their own subtle characteristics

The culinary art is blended with the landscape architecture of Eastern philosophical value, creating many conditions for Vietnamese tourism to exploit its cultural and historical strengths.

1.3 Seasonality in Vietnam tourism

There can be some comments about seasonality in Vietnam tourism as follows:

Vietnam is a country with favorable tourism resources for year-round tourism business development.

Our country stretches across 15 degrees of latitude from North to South, giving Vietnam a diverse climate. Vietnam is the only country in Southeast Asia with a cold winter. The North and Central regions have four seasons: Spring, Summer, Fall, and Winter; while in the South, the climate is hot and humid all year round, with a long, smooth coastline that is favorable for year-round sea tourism.

Human resources are everywhere and distributed over many times of the year, so seasonality can be limited and the intensity of tourism seasonality can be reduced.

The peak season for domestic tourism and international tourism are different.

Domestic tourists travel mainly for swimming, relaxing, and visiting festivals. They travel mainly in the summer months and the first months of the year. Meanwhile, international tourists currently come to Vietnam mainly for business purposes combined with tourism, so they come to Vietnam during the main business season of the year (from October to March of the following year). The flow of domestic tourists is much larger than international tourists. Therefore, at the macro level, if we consider only active international tourism business activities, the main tourism season is from October at the end of the year to March of the following year. If we consider tourism business activities in general, our country has two main tourism seasons: summer and winter.

spring.

The tourist season, the length of the tourist season and the intensity of tourism in major cities, provinces and tourist centers are different . This depends on the development and tourism potential of each locality. Some economic centers such as Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City always attract a large number of visitors to do business and then combine it with tourism purposes, so these two places have a large number of tourists all year round and peak in some months before and after Tet. If considering the purpose of pure tourism, some provinces and cities have advantages in developing sea tourism such as Quang Ninh, Khanh Hoa, Thanh Hoa... the summer months are the main tourist season. Some places have many festivals and pagodas such as Ha Tay, Bac Ninh... early spring is the time when many visitors from all over the world gather. In addition, some large modern tourist centers such as Ha Long, Nha Trang... always have a longer tourist season than less developed centers.

1.3 Labor in Vietnam tourism

Currently, the number of workers working in tourism is about 230,000 direct workers and 500,000 indirect workers, accounting for 2.5% of the national workforce and mainly under 30 years old (60%). The tourism workforce in Vietnam also has the main characteristics of tourism workers in general but also has differences due to the impact of Vietnam's socio-economic conditions.

Labor in Vietnam tourism can also be divided into three components, the group of laborers with the function of state management of tourism, the group of laborers training and developing tourism and the group of laborers doing tourism business. Of which, the group of laborers doing tourism business accounts for about 99%, the remaining two groups of laborers account for an insignificant proportion in the labor structure in tourism.

Labor group with the function of State management of tourism : This labor group includes those working in tourism management agencies from the central to local levels such as the Ministry of Sports, Culture and Tourism, the General Department of Tourism, the Department of Tourism or the Department of Trade and Tourism of provinces and cities, and the Department of Tourism management in districts and towns. They are the labor force that plays an important role in orienting the development of tourism in the country and in each locality. On the other hand, they also represent the State to guide, help create conditions for tourism businesses to operate effectively as well as to inspect and supervise those business activities. The current staff of officials and civil servants in the tourism sector has a very limited staffing (the General Department of Tourism currently has 135 staffing; the Departments of Tourism have about 15 staffing; the Departments of Tourism-Trade and the Departments of Trade-Tourism have about 3-5 staffing), accounting for an insignificant proportion of the tourism labor structure.

Group of workers working in the field of tourism research and training: This is a group of workers with deep expertise responsible for training and research in vocational schools or universities, colleges, and research institutes specializing in tourism science in Vietnam. Currently, the network of tourism training facilities in Vietnam has about 40 universities and colleges; over 30 professional high schools, vocational schools and many vocational training centers nationwide. The work of those working in tourism training and research has a significant impact on the quality of labor in Vietnam's tourism, their role can be compared to that of machines in the production process. However, this group of workers in Vietnam's tourism is still quite small, the tourism training sector in Vietnam has not developed commensurate with the growth rate and potential of Vietnam's tourism. The proportion of people working in tourism training and research is currently very small compared to the total number of tourism workers in the country and is much lower than other Southeast Asian countries. During the past time,

In the coming time, if we do not soon have more development research institutes, high-quality tourism training schools, and cooperation plans for teaching with other countries, the Vietnamese tourism industry will be at risk of lacking the next generation of cadres and high-quality human resources.

Tourism business workers : In Vietnam, tourism business has only really developed in the past decade, but with an average growth rate of 20% per year, tourism business is a field that attracts many workers. Workers in the tourism business can be divided into two main groups.

- Labor management in tourism business.

- Real labor

Managerial workers in tourism business: Are those who work in management in Vietnamese tourism businesses from small, medium to high management levels. Due to the characteristics of the tourism industry, this group of workers accounts for a much smaller proportion than the proportion of executive workers, about 24-25% of the total number of workers in tourism. In Vietnam, most tourism businesses are small and very small, so the level of specialization is not high, many of them in addition to management work also take on many other tourism activities.

Laborers performing tourism business operations: This force accounts for 75% of the labor force in tourism, of which receptionists are 9%, room service is 14.8%, food service (table, bar) is 15%, cooks are 10.6%, travel agents and tour guides are 4.9%, drivers, cruise ship staff are 10.6% and the remaining 36.5% are workers in other occupations. As the subjects in direct contact with tourists, it can be said that they are the ones who represent the face of Vietnam tourism, their attitude and expertise have a great influence on tourists' satisfaction.

Some solutions to develop Vietnam tourism - 5

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