VietNamNet Bridge - While some economists say that Vietnam has too many hotels and resorts, others believe that Vietnam’s tourism infrastructure is still inadequate compared with the rest of the world.

The participants at a workshop on tourism infrastructure development held several days ago all agreed that developing tourism and turning it into a key sector is the right way for Vietnam to follow.

Luong Hoai Nam, CEO of Vietstar Airlines, member of the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism’s Advisory Council, said that Vietnam has many advantages to develop tourism.

“Vietnamese cannot succeed with industries and technologies,” he said. “We once tried to develop shipbuilding, automobile and electronics industries. We strived to become a developed industry country by 2020. However, 15 out of 20 criteria prove to be unattainable."

As for agriculture development, Nam thinks that Vietnam would not be able to access high technologies if it maintains the household-based production method. 

If the country does not not apply high technologies, Vietnam won’t be able to obtain high productivity.

How about tourism? This is within reach.

“Vietnam still has to hire foreign managers and foreign cooks. However, we are still the owners of hotels in our homeland,” he said, adding that it is a right way to decide that tourism must be developed into a key economic sector.

Nguyen Tran Nam, chair of the Vietnam Real Estate Association, former Deputy Minister of Construction, shared the same view with Luong Hoai Nam, saying that Vietnam’s GDP growth rate in the first quarter of 2017 was very low, 5.1 percent, with low industrial growth rate in industrial production and big difficulties for agriculture production due to climate change.

According to Le Dang Doanh, renowned economist, former head of CIEM, the UN has recently discussed countries which have escaped underdevelopment and named Mali as an example that escaped from poverty thanks to tourism development. 

Doanh believes that developing tourism could also be the way for Vietnam.

Nam said he heard comments that Vietnam has hotels and resorts in abundance, but he doesn’t agree.

“Vietnam’s tourism infrastructure, especially entertainment complexes, is nothing compared with the rest of the world,” he said.

He said that the number of 5-star hotel rooms in Vietnam is still modest compared with other regional countries. 

Meanwhile, some big tourism complexes in provinces could help make localities famous tourism destinations. Binh Dinh province is a typical example.

Nam said in 2016, Vietnam received 10 million foreign travelers, while Singapore had 20 million, Hong Kong 25 million and Thailand 30 million.

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