Turning itself into an attractive destination and developing the image of Hoa Binh people as beautiful, civilized, friendly, and hospitable ones in order to impress domestic and foreign visitors is the responsibility of the authorities and entire people of Hoa Binh province.

Hoa Binh province, 80 km from the capital city of Hanoi, has a relatively convenient transportation network (Ho Chi Minh Road, National Highways 6, 12B, 21, 15A, 70B), which is being improved to form a belt axis going through Hoa Binh (including the road linking Hoa Binh - Hanoi and Son La expressway).

The province has a relatively thick and evenly distributed river system with many large rivers like Da and Ma. Its soil and climate conditions are diverse, and the land is fertile. The area of forestry land, agricultural land and unused land is large, while the forest coverage (51.5%) is higher than the national average.

The province has 4 nature reserves, namely Ngoc Son - Ngo Luong, Thuong Tien, Pu Canh, and Hang Kia - Pa Co, with diverse ecosystems; hot mineral water sources in the districts of Kim Boi, Lac Son, and Yen Thuy. The Hoa Binh Lake has a water surface area of 8,000 hectares, with 9.5 billion m3 and many islands, creating a charming landscape. The lake is considered a pearl and will be developed into a national tourist area.

Hoa Binh is also home to cultural quintessence of Vietnamese people, with many scenic spots, historical and cultural relics, temples and pagodas with many traditional folk festivals imbued with national cultural identity. Typical examples include the Rice Field Festival (Khuong Mua) of the Muong people; Ke Pagoda Festival; Lo Son Fishing Festival; Cao Phong Orange Festival…

In particular, Hoa Binh hosts one of the country’s largest projects – the Hoa Binh Hydroelectric Plant, a symbol of Vietnam’s industrialization and modernization. The province also has great potential in developing supporting industries, agricultural product processing industries, has relatively rich mineral resources, especially clay, limestone, coal...

Over the past years, Hoa Binh province has paid attention to leading and directing the synchronous implementation of development solutions to build attractive destinations, the image of Hoa Binh people being beautiful, civilized, friendly, and hospitable, impressing local and international visitors.

Promoting cultural values

Regarding culture, Hoa Binh province identifies culture as the spiritual foundation of society, demonstrating the height and depth of intelligence and level of development. Cultural values have a lasting and pervasive vitality, creating the longevity of each nation. Inheriting the nation’s traditional values, Hoa Binh province has always attached importance to the role of culture, paying special attention to the work of building and developing culture.

The provincial authorities have maximized the human factor, considering people as the center, subject, most important resource and goal of development, taking the cultural and human values of Vietnam as the foundation and important endogenous strength to ensure sustainable development.

Thanks to the leadership of the provincial Party Committee and authorities at all levels, and the active coordination and propaganda of the provincieal Vietnam Fatherland Front and socio-political organizations, cultural activities have been implemented well, step by step repeling negative phenomena in social life.

The movement called “All people unite to build cultural life” has been carried out widely in Hoa Binh province, contributing to building a healthy cultural environment, ensuring security and national defense, creating a solid foundation for local socio-economic development, improving the material and spiritual life of the people.

Many emulation movements have been launched throughout all aspects of social life, which have been actively responded to by local people and agencies. Typical movements include the "Hoa Binh Youth Forum for creativity and entrepreneurship" launched by the Provincial Youth Union; the model of "Innovating practices and working methods to improve the efficiency of citizen reception work" and "Supporting the community to prevent human trafficking crimes" initiated by the local police agency.

In 2022, the province had 87.9% of households winning the title of "Cultural Family"; 95.1% of residential areas received the title of "Cultural Residential Area"; 1,360/1,481 agencies, organizations, and enterprises meeting cultural standards (92%).

The local authorities have also paid great attention to the implementation of regulations on management, protection and promotion of tangible and intangible cultural heritage values of ethnic groups in Hoa Binh province. The province currently has 41 national level, 61 provincial-level relics, and more than 102 protected relics.

Traditional cultural values of ethnic minorities have been well preserved and promoted. To date, the province has had 4 intangible cultural heritages recognized as National Intangible Cultural Heritage such as: Mo Muong Hoa Binh; Gong Art of the Muong ethnic group; Khai Ha Festival; Bamboo calendar of the Muong people.

There are 1,482 performing arts troupes in villages, hamlets, and residential groups with tens of thousands of amateur actors and artists. On average, these troupes organize about 10,000 performances serving over 2 million viewers annually. Some community tourism villages have up to 6 troupes that regularly perform for tourists.

Mass cultural and artistic activities have contributed to satisfying the needs of the people, preserving and promoting the intangible cultural heritage of ethnic groups in Hoa Binh and developing community tourism, improving the lives of people in remote, highland and extremely disadvantaged areas.

To effectively implement the strategy for developing Vietnam's cultural industries to 2020, with a vision to 2030, on April 12, 2017, the Provincial People's Committee issued Plan No. 39/KH-UBND to implement this strategy in Hoa Binh province.

The plan sets out specific tasks for each field such as advertising, handicrafts, fashion design, cinema, performing arts, fine arts, photography, and exhibitions. In particular, cultural tourism will become a service economic sector contributing to the province's economic growth.

The Provincial People's Committee has also issued and directed the implementation of Plan No. 46/KH-UBND (March 15, 2022) on the implementation of the Cultural Development Strategy until 2030; Plan No. 66/KH-UBND (April 19, 2022) implementing the Cultural Diplomacy Strategy until 2030 in Hoa Binh province; Plan No. 79/KH-UBND (May 5, 2022) implementing the External Cultural Strategy of Hoa Binh province for the period 2022 - 2026.

Building a friendly and safe tourism environment

With its potential and strengths in tourism, Hoa Binh province is inviting investment in tourism development projects to form high-quality tourist areas and destinations, with a focus on the Hoa Binh lake and potential sites such as Kim Boi, Lac Son, Lac Thuy...

To achieve the set goals in developing cultural tourism, the local government will focus on building Hoa Binh into an attractive destination with typical tourism products, and the largest tourism center in the northern midland and mountainous areas, creating a safe, friendly, competitive, civilized and equal tourism environment;

Maximize advantages to develop tourism into a key economic sector; Increase the proportion of the tourism industry in the province's economy structure, make a positive contribution to socio-economic development, creating jobs for local people, and create spillover effect to draw investment in other related economic sectors;

Pay attention to tourism development planning; focus on mobilizing capital sources for infrastructure investment, prioritizing investment in tourism infrastructure in the Master Plan for developing Hoa Binh Lake National Tourist Area to effectively exploit Hoa Binh’s tourism potential;

Tourism development to move from "quantity" to "quality", towards proactive integration, improving efficiency and professionalism; build branded tourism products with high competitivenes, meeting the requirements of target markets.

Develop tourism in a sustainable direction, associated with preserving and promoting the cultural identities of ethnic groups; preserving the landscape, protecting the environment and biodiversity, responding to climate change, ensuring national defense, security, social order and safety.

Quynh Nga