VietNamNet Bridge – The number of Vietnamese traveling abroad has grown 20% in the year’s first half, with more tourists preferring long-haul tours, according to travel firms.

At some major tour operators in HCMC such as Saigontourist, Fiditourist, Ben Thanh Tourist and Perfect Tour Travel, many customers still favor tours to regional countries such as Thailand, Singapore and Malaysia.

However, though there are few customers, long-haul tours to Europe, the U.S., Australia and Canada have posted high sales revenue growth.

Nguyen The Khai, director of Perfect Tour Travel, said outbound tour sales have inched up around 20% this year. The firm arranges long-haul tours for an average of 10 groups and short-haul trips for about 20 groups a month, he added.

From 80% to 90% of the Vietnamese visitors to the U.S., Europe and Canada are individual tourists, meaning they self-finance their visits. “The outbound tourism sector is doing good business while the domestic travel sector is not. Economic difficulties seem to have left little or no impact on outbound tourism,” Khai said.

Nguyen Viet Hung, general director of Fiditourist, said outbound tourism had been spared by the tough economic circumstances in the past two years.

“Tours of Dubai and Europe are selling well. This outbound segment has contributed greatly to our revenues,” Hung said.

According to Doan Thi Thanh Tra, marketing manager of Saigontourist, prices of outbound tours have remained steady this year, with tours to Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore and China even discounted by VND3-10 million per person. Saigontourist has seen more individuals and groups buying long-distance tours.

“We have had around 22,000 guests traveling abroad in the year’s first half, up over 10% year-on-year and those taking long-haul tours account for nearly 30%,” Tra said.

Some travel firms in HCMC said their major corporate clients are mainly in the pharmaceutical, insurance and oil sectors. Some have spent billions of Vietnamese dong buying outbound tours for their partners and customers.

Some 3.5 million Vietnamese spent an estimated US$3.5 billion doing overseas traveling last year, according to calculations by the Vietnam Tourism Association based on reports of some foreign tourism promotion agencies.

Each year, there are around 1.1 million Vietnamese traveling to China, one million to Cambodia, 500,000 to Thailand, 300,000 to Singapore, 200,000 to Malaysia and 110,000 to South Korea.

Source: SGT