The central city of Da Nang is diversifying a number of its high-quality tourism products and services to attract more visitors from home and abroad.

According to the EU-funded programme for environmentally and socially responsible tourism capacity development, close to 79.11 percent of international tourists arrived in Da Nang for the first time and more than 60 percent are likely to return.

The number of foreign visitors to the city in the first few months of the year was stable and grew by 10 percent thanks to the launch of new air routes from the Republic of Korea, Japan, China and Thailand, said Chairman of the Da Nang Tourism Association Huynh Tan Vinh.

Da Nang was listed among the top 10 most attractive destinations in Asia in 2013 and 2014 by readers of Smart Travel Asia, a leading regional online travel magazine. It also took the top spot in the online travel review site TripAdvisor’s “Destinations on the Rise in 2015” awards, and ranked sixth of the 10 most improved cities globally in 2015 by Canada’s Richest magazine.

Under the city’s tourism development orientations through 2020, the city will continue promoting its image in traditional markets such as Western Europe, Northern America and Eastern Europe while expanding to others in Middle Eastern countries and India.

The city expects to welcome more visitors from Hanoi, Hai Phong, Quang Ninh and Ho Chi Minh City, along with Mekong Delta and Central Highland localities.

The tourism sector has put forth measures to draw foreign visitors, particularly from the Republic of Korea, Japan and Russia, while consulting the municipal People’s Committee to issue a tourism promotion plan between 2016 and 2020, promote tourism events and launch additional international air routes to the city.

The municipal Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism has built and carried out tourism promotion programmes of Da Nang, Thua Thien-Hue and Quang Nam in the Republic of Korea.

The city is expected to exempt Value-Added Tax (VAT) for tourists or arrange tax refund sites at airports while designing special products for foreign visitors.

Director of the municipal Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism Ngo Quang Vinh said Da Nang aims to build the city into a tourism centre for visitors in the central and Central Highland regions.

More air routes to Da Nang will be launched while coordination with central localities to build high-quality tourism products will be strengthened, he added.

The city has also devised policies to support businesses to develop various forms of tourism such as shopping, building amusement parks and organising cuisine events.

Da Nang welcomed over 3.8 million tourists and grossed 9.8 trillion VND in revenue last year. This year, the city hopes to greet more than 4.43 million vacationers and earn 11.8 trillion VND (540 million USD).

It has favourable natural conditions, international airports and seaports to develop tourism. The average growth of tourism from 2011-2015 was estimated at 20.14 percent – from 2.4 million arrivals in 2011 to nearly 3.9 million in 2014.

The city is home to 74 tourism investment projects worth nearly 8.1 million USD.

So far, the city has 23 air travel routes, including 9 direct and 14 chartered.

VNA