Ha Noi strives for meeting target of 23.6m visitors in 2017

Reports from the Ha Noi Statistics Office showed that the capital welcomed over 17.9 million tourists in the first nine months of the year, a year-on-year rise of 9%. Of the total, foreign tourists reached over 3.53 million, up 23.5%. Most tourists to Ha Noi during the period were from China, the Republic of Korea, Japan, France, the US, Germany, Australia, Malaysia, Thailand and Canada.
With this year’s target of increasing the number of tourists to the city by 8% against 2016, the capital’s tourist authorities therefore will have to strive at the end months of the year.
According to the Hanoi Tourism Department, it will focus on coordinating with relevant agencies and tour operators to improve the quality of the city’s destinations, especially cultural tourism ones, such as the Imperial Citadel of Thang Long; the artist village of Co Do and the community based tourism in three communes of Ba Trai, Van Hoa and Ba Vi in the Ba Vi District; and the Huong Son tourist resort in the My Duc District.

Foreign visitors take xich lo (cyclo) to move around the old quarter of Ha Noi.

The department will also sign cooperation agreements with Hung Yen, Hai Duong, Vinh Phuc, Bac Ninh, Hoa Binh and southwestern provinces to develop new tourism products.
Besides organizing events including the 16th annual meeting of the Council for Promoting Tourism in Asia (CPTA) in Hanoi from October 20-25, 2017 to promote domestic tourism, the department will participate in major international tourism fairs such as the General Assembly of the Asia Pacific Cities Tourism Promotion Council (TPO) in South Korea; international tourism fairs and road shows in Japan, America, France, England; the Van Nam - Lao Cai - Quang Ninh - Hai Phong corridor cooperation meeting in Hai Phong.
The cooperation program with CNN to promote Hanoi on CNN international channel will be continued in 2017.
The Department of Tourism has so far collaborate with the diplomatic missions, international organizations, Vietnamese embassies abroad; airlines, media agencies, domestic and foreign major travel agents to introduce, promote, coordinate, exploit, and develop the domestic and international tourism markets.
Especially, the city will complete the review to adjust and supplement the Master plan on Ha Noi tourism development to 2020, vision 2030; deploy the plan to develop Suoi Hai Lake in Ba Vi District to be a national tourism area by 2025, vision 2030.
 The city also focuses on improving the quality of tourism human resources to meet the requirements of a new era.
The Ha Noi tourism sector last year made positive contribution to local economic development, gaining revenue of VND 61.75 trillion, up 12 percent against the previous year. It received over 4 million international visitors, up 23 percent against the previous year. Of which, nearly 2.9 million tourists made their stay in the capital, an increase of 24 percent./.