Foreign tourists visit One-pillar Pagoda, a well-known attraction in Hanoi. (Photo: VNA)
Hanoi (VNA) – Vietnam welcomed
more than 9.4 million international tourists in the first nine months of 2017,
a year-on-year rise of 28.4 percent.
Meanwhile the number of domestic visitors hit
57.9 million in January-September.
The tourism sector grossed 376 trillion VND (16.54 billion
USD) in revenue, up 26.5 percent against the same period last year.
In September, the Vietnam National
Administration of Tourism (VNAT) organised the first national tourism skill
contest, aiming to honour tourism workers and share experience in the field.
The VNAT also launched promotion programmes in
key markets such as the North European countries of Denmark, Norway, Finland
and Sweden (from September 13-22); and the Japanese cities of Kanagawa, Tokyo,
Sendai and Nagoya (from September 15-23).
It is promoting Vietnamese tourism in three
Southeast Asian markets, namely Indonesia, Malaysia, and Thailand from
September 25-30.
Vietnam has also participated in major
international fairs such as the JATA Tourism Expo in Tokyo, Japan, from
September 21-24, and the Top Resa Tourism Trade Fair in Paris from September
26-29.
The country has defined Japan as a key market in
tourism development plans.
In recent years, Japan has been among the top
three countries in terms of tourist arrivals to Vietnam.
In 2016, the country served about 74,000 Japanese tourists,
up 10 percent against the previous year.
As many as 518,028 Japanese visited the Southeast Asian
nation in the first eight months of this year.
Vietnam aims to serve 13 million international
tourists in 2017.-VNA