The number of travelers to Indonesia, South Korea and Japan is increasing rapidly.

Nhu Thi Ngan, CEO of Hanoi Tourism JSC, said after the pandemic, Vietnamese travelers have fewer choices about destinations because of different pandemic policies applied by countries. Only countries that have reopened their tourism markets and removed all barriers, such as required testing and quarantine, can attract tourists.

Tours to Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Japan, South Korea and Dubai are attractive destinations.

The numbers of travelers booking tours to Indonesia and South Korea are the highest, as tours have reasonable fees, VND10-17 million per traveler, and the procedures are simple. 

According to Ngan, travelers to Bali don’t have to test for Covid-19, and don’t need visas. Meanwhile, South Korea offers a visa-free policy applied to Vietnamese travelers booking tours with designated travel agencies and entering South Korea at Yang Yang Airport.

Vu Bich Hue from Flamingo Redtours said that the outbound market developed significantly after Japan, South Korea and Taiwan (China) began fully reopening their markets in Q4.

The tours are chosen by many Vietnamese not only because of invitations and tourism promotion campaigns, but also because the countries are in the most beautiful season of the year – the red leaf season.

As for the Japanese market, a representative of a Hanoi-based travel firm revealed that the firm organizes tours to Japan every week, 25-50 travelers each time. It is seeking travelers to Japan to enjoy the spring, with the departure time on the first and second day of the lunar new year.

At Hanoi Tourism, Nga revealed that the firm has served nearly 3,000 Vietnamese traveling abroad this year.

A representative of TST Tourist said the company’s outbound tourism has recovered by 90 percent. The markets witnessing the strongest growth include Southeast Asia, Europe, and America, followed by South Korea and Japan.

He hopes that outbound tourists see a strong jump by the end of 2023 and fully recover from 2024.

As for Vietravel, its Q3 financial report showed that in September 2022, revenue from outbound tours accounted for 50 percent of total revenue, nearly equal to the proportion of 66 percent seen in the pre-pandemic period.

Tran Thi Bao Thu from Fiditour-Vietluxtour noted that the number of outbound travelers is still not comparable to pre-pandemic years. However, the figure is relatively good compared with the same period last year, after tourism promotion agencies began to actively cooperate with travel firms to advertise and stimulate demand.

According to Ngan, the number of travelers has gradually recovered, but travelers have tightened their purse strings, so demand still has not increased sharply. 

Meanwhile, travel firms are meeting some problems, including cost increases because of gasoline prices and exchange rate fluctuations. The US dollar price has soared.

However, the situation is expected to improve from 2023. The modest growth is still considered an optimistic sign for the tourism industry.

JNTO (Japan National Tourism Organization) reported that the number of Vietnamese travelers to Japan reached 30,900 in September, a decrease of 19.4 percent compared with the same period of 2019, but a 2,953 percent increase compared with the same period last year.

In the first nine months of the year, as many as 191,500 Vietnamese traveled to Japan, with Vietnam ranking second, after South Korea, in the number of foreigners entering Japan.

According to the Singapore Tourism Board, Vietnam ranks fifth among Singapore’s key tourism markets. In 2019, the country received 600,000 Vietnamese travelers and by the end of August 2022, the figure had reached 124,000.

The Tourism Authority of Thailand reported that Vietnam is among five countries with the highest numbers of travelers to Thailand, with 324,000 travelers in the first 10 months of 2022.

Ngoc Ha