The world’s renowned travel guide, the Lonely Planet, has rated Vietnam ’ Mekong Delta region ninth out of the 10 best value destinations for 2012.

’s rice basket, the Mekong Delta is a watery landscape of green fields and sleepy villages, everywhere crisscrossed by the brown canals and rivulets fed by the mighty Mekong River ,” the Lonely Planet said in its website.

The inhabitants of this region – friendly and easygoing people – have long toiled on the life-sustaining river, with the fruits of their labour depending on natures cycles that govern the waterways.

The delta, which produces enough rice to supply the domestic market and a sizable surplus, was formed by sediment deposited by the Mekong River over many years. The process continues today, with silt deposits extending the shoreline by as much as 80m per year. The river is so large that it has two daily tides.

Lush with rice paddies and fish farms, this delta also nourishes the cultivation of sugarcane, fruit, coconuts and shrimp.

Although the area is primarily rural, it is one of the most densely populated regions in Vietnam and nearly every hectare is intensively farmed.

“The uniquely southern charm with its welcoming introduction to life along the river is the real draw, and visitors can explore quaint riverside towns, sample fruits bartered in the colourful floating markets or dine on home-cooked delicacies before overnighting as a homestay guest,” it said.

Other highlights include visits to local orchards, flower markets and fish farms. There are also bird sanctuaries, beach getaways and impressive Khmer pagodas in the region.

In addition to highlighting the Mekong Delta as one of the tope ten best destinations, the travel guide also said that Vietnam is always a good value destination for tourists.

The nine other top destinations include the northeast of the US , San Francisco , Japan , Tajikistan , Porto in Portugal , Lesotho in southern Africa, Iquitos in Peru , Ohrid in Macedonia and Merida , Mexico .

Earlier, the US Tourism Association (USTOA) named Vietnam as top destination for 2012.
Source: VNA

New Open World will announce New Seven Wonders of the World on November 11, 2011, under a campaign launched by it in order for people worldwide to vote for new wonders of the world. So far, more than one million messages have been sent to 147 voting for the Ha Long Bay as a new wonder of the world.
Pham Minh Chinh, the secretary of the Quang Ninh Province Party Committee, said that many forms of voting for the Ha Long Bay would be applied in the final stage. Among these would be messaging, which is an easy way to vote for Ha Long as a new wonder of the world.
Chinh said that Quang Ninh Province would continue investing in tourist projects and ensure the environment in the bay to make it a really attractive and impressive destination for domestic and foreign visitors.
Each and every Vietnamese citizen or those who love Vietnam can make part in getting Ha Long reach the title “New Wonder of the World” by voting at the website http://www.new7wonders.com or dial + 1.869 760.5990 and press 7712 to vote for Ha Long. They can also compose a text message (Halong) and send it to 147. Now is the most important time to show Vietnam’s efforts made during the last three years.
The National Steering Committee on World Wonder Propaganda and Voting Encouragement got together with ministries, central and local authorities and organizations to call on people to vote for Ha Long and present the wonderful place to people at home and abroad. This explains why the Ha Long Bay has always been in a high position among the 28 wonders of the world that went to the final round.
In the first nine months of this year alone, the Ha Long Bay received almost three million foreign visitors, marking a 25 percent increase from the same months last year. UNESCO twice acknowledged the bay as a world natural heritage site. In the event that the Ha Long Bay gains recognition as a new wonder of the world, Vietnam will certainly become one of the most attractive destinations in the world and the national name will be improved. Opportunities are nearing depending on each and every citizen who will vote for the bay.

Source: VEN

Delegates to an international tourism held here on Tuesday called for stronger ties between regional countries, especially in infrastructure, travel and promotion activity, to further attract visitors.

Easier traveling for guests will do, said Nguyen Thuong Hoang Hai, sales and marketing manager of the national flag carrier Vietnam Airlines.
Speaking at the conference attended by tourism ministers of Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia and Myanmar, Hai said the countries concerned should have concrete cooperation steps to develop a common tourism market in line with the theme of the conference.
He cited loosened visa requirements to be of utmost importance.
“The whole region should loosen visa requirements for guests from major source markets such as Europe, Northeast Asia, the United States and Australia,” he said at the “Four Countries – One Destination” conference. The event saw the attendance of some 200 delegates who are tourism enterprises, officials, and investors.
Statistics given at the conference supported Hai’s view.
Three out of ten tourists coming to Vietnam will visit the other countries despite the lack of facilities for them to travel easily among the four nations.
Hoang Tuan Anh, Minister of Culture, Sports, and Tourism, stressed the need for concerted efforts in investment.
“From now to 2030, Vietnam needs investments as much as US$100 billion, so we encourage local as well as foreign investors to contribute capital. We will also cooperate with the regional countries for mutual development,” Anh said.
However, as the four nations faced the limits in terms of the human resources as well as infrastructure, are considered very important for the development, he said.
Seconding the minister’s viewpoint, Hai of Vietnam Airlines suggested further investment in creating new tourism products.
Hai said that cooperation is necessary to create competitive packages as well as good marketing programs for the whole region. He referred to the cooperation between Vietnam Airlines and Korean Air in 2004-05 period to carry out the program worth US$4 million to promote the Ha Long – Siem Riep route in Korea, which has paid off.
He said that this program saw arrivals from Korea in Cambodia to surge 69% in 2005 and 30% annually in the following years.
Delegates to the conference observed that the issues on cooperation to promote the four nations as a common destination had been mention for one year now, but little has been done since last year’s conference. Apart from the expansion of the flight network, the remaining issues including expansion of road transport network and a common visa scheme for guests remained unchanged, they said.
Despite the loose cooperation, the regional tourism has fared well.
Vietnam’s tourism minister said that in 2010, the four countries had attracted 11 million international arrivals, up 25% against the previous year, which was considered a high growth level compared to the average growth level of the world’s tourism industry.
The conference is part of the HCMC International Travel Expo which was opened on Tuesday evening at InterContinental Asiana Saigon hotel. The event last night also incorporated the program Vietnam Night to introduce Vietnam’s tourism image to some 150 international customers.
On Thursday, the exhibitions and meetings between buyers and tourism product sellers will take place at the Saigon Exhibition and Convention Center in District 7.

Source: The Saigon times

Prince junk halong bay – Three- to five-star hotels in Hanoi performed better than their peers in HCMC in terms of the average room rate though room occupancy in the capital was lower, according to the market researcher Savills Vietnam Ltd.A report from Savills Vietnam Ltd. showed that the average room rate in Hanoi in the second quarter was US$87 per night, or US$4 higher than the rate in HCMC. Meanwhile, average occupancy in the capital was 55% compared to 60% in HCMC.

However, both cities experienced a substantial fall in both indicators above because of the inbound sector’s low season, according to the report.

Savills said the room rate in HCMC was down 12 percentage points compared to the first quarter of this year while the rate in Hanoi was down only 2 percentage points. Hanoi had 48 three-to five-star hotels.

The company said more than 552,000 foreign visitors visited the capital in the first six months of this year, up 20% year-on-year along with nearly 5.9 million domestic visitors. However, this figure differs greatly from official statistics of Hanoi.

Mai Tien Dung, deputy director of Hanoi City’s Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism, told the Daily that the total number of foreign visitors to the city in the first half reached nearly one million.

There were 665,000 visitors who stayed at the city’s hotels, and over 300,000 guests who just visited Hanoi within a day, Dung said.

Savills estimated that the total number of travelers to Hanoi would increase in the third quarter as local government has plans to boost tourism alongside summer promotions from tourism agencies.

However, for the short-term development, the company said that supply will increase faster than demand in Hanoi in the next five years. The future hotels are being developed in mixed-use projects such as Intercontinental Hanoi Landmark and the Marriot at 58 Tay Ho Street among others.

In the rest of this year only, the city will have around 400 more hotel rooms.

Source: SGT

Prince Junk in Halong Bay – Nearby markets are the ones that Vietnamese travel firms are targeting now, because they believe that in the context of economic difficulties, when travelers have to fasten their belt, they would plan short-distance tours to save up money.

Vietnamese travel firms are hurrying to draw up the plans to promote tourism for 2011 and 2012. A lot of tourism promotion campaigns will be launched by travel firms to attract more foreign tourists to Vietnam. Especially the firms will focus on nearby markets.

According to the Institute for Tourism Development Research ITDR, defining the key markets and the exact forecasts about the development potentials will help policy makers to draw up reasonable tourism development strategies. Meanwhile, reasonable strategies will allow to develop loyal markets and find new markets, thus helping attracting more and more tourists to Vietnam.

The countries and territories in Northern Asia (China, Japan, Taiwan and South Korea), in Eastern Europe (France, the UK and Germany) and in other continents such as the US, Australia have been the most important markets for Vietnam. Meanwhile, the last 2-3 years have witnessed the rapid increases of the numbers of tourists from ASEAN countries, including Cambodia, Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore.

According to the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism (VNAT), besides the nearby markets, existing markets have been growing steadily. These remain the most important markets for Vietnam’s tourism. The images of Vietnam have become familiar to the travelers from the countries; while Vietnamese travel firms have got experiences in serving the travelers.

However, VNAT said that the rapid growth rates of new markets in the region have shown new great potentials for Vietnam’s tourism. Providing good tourism products to expand the existing markets and satisfying the demand of newly emerging markets are the two goals for Vietnam’s tourism.

According to ITDR, in 2004, South Korea was considered a new market for Vietnam. However, South Korean quickly became the second biggest market in the top 10 key markets in 2006-2008.

Most recently, Japan has become a key market with 300,000 Japanese travelers arriving to Vietnam every year. In fact, the number of Japanese tourists to Vietnam once decreased sharply by 40 percent due to the earthquake. However, a strong recovery has been reported in the market.

Vietravel said that the travel firm received three groups of 700 Japanese travelers in early July, the biggest groups of travelers who come to Vietnam after the catastrophe in March.

Vietravel believes that Japan is the most important market for Vietnam’s tourism with the number of tourists to Vietnam to increase by 15-20 percent over 2010. Bui Nguyen Tam Dang, a senior executive of Vietravel said that despite the severe damages, Japan still has great potentials and it can recover soon. Experts say the market will fully recover from the third quarter of 2011.

With the visa waving policy for international tourists to Vietnam, experts have predicted the rise of the two regional countries – Thailand and Cambodia. Besides, Malaysia and Singapore also prove to be the potential markets

The old markets in Northern Asia always bring the highest proportions of tourists to Vietnam. The number of Chinese tourists goes up and down regularly, but China has been leading the markets.

In North America, Vietnam expects to receive many travelers from the US. Most of them are war veterans who want to return to the old battle, and Viet Kieu (overseas Vietnamese) who want to return to the homeland.

In the first six months of 2011, Vietnam received 3 million foreign travelers, an increase of 18.1 percent in comparison with the same period of 2010.

C. V

A new beautiful cave has been discovered in Na Hang primeval forest in the northern province of Tuyen Quang.

The cave measuring 8m high, 15m wide and 100m deep, was found while workers were implementing a site clearance project to build National Highway No.279. It has water and sedimentary rock formations in various shapes.

Pham Ninh Thai, Chairman of the Na Hang District People’s Committee, says that the committee is working with relevant agencies to preserve the cave for tourism development and scientific research.

Source: VOV

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