Cat Ba tourism awakens the golden potential that has been asleep before the holiday April 30 – May 1

Cat Ba’s green tourism potential – a golden advantage in marine tourism development

On the morning of April 20, Hai Phong Department of Tourism and Tien Phong newspaper coordinated to organize a seminar “Hai Phong Tourism – Golden opportunity for breakthrough” at Flamingo Cat Ba resort. As the top attractive destination of Hai Phong, Cat Ba tourism wishes to awaken the tourism potential that has “sleeped” before entering the upcoming holiday season.

As a famous tourist destination, Cat Ba converges 5 national and international titles: Scenic Landscape – Special National Monument, World Biosphere Reserve, National Park, Marine Conservation Area and National Park. It is one of the most beautiful bays in the world.

With outstanding value, Cat Ba archipelago is being submitted to UNESCO for recognition as a World Natural Heritage Site (along with Ha Long Bay). Hai Phong is identified as a destination with an important position, a special driving force for coastal tourism development. However, in order for these potentials to turn into opportunities, bringing port tourism to the right position still requires a lot of effort.

At the seminar “Hai Phong Tourism – A golden opportunity for breakthrough”, Mr. Nguyen Le Phuc, Deputy Director of the General Department of Tourism pointed out: “In the general trend of the process of opening up tourism nationwide, Cat tourism She needs to quickly carry out activities to restart tourism as soon as the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism issues a plan to reopen tourism activities under new normal conditions.

“Hai Phong is a locality with many favorable conditions for tourism development. It is an important traffic hub and one of the major sea tourism centers of the Northern region and the whole country.

As a long-standing land with many important cultural traditions, history, festivals as well as rich natural tourism resources associated with the sea and ecotourism resources, Hai Phong tourism is oriented to develop. sustainable, becoming one of the national tourist attractions, imbued with the identity and people of Hai Phong.

However, besides the remarkable results, even before the epidemic, Hai Phong tourism still had some limitations such as the speed of tourism infrastructure development did not meet the needs of visitors.

The issue of tourism environment has not been completely resolved, especially at the peak of domestic tourists; destination overload causes frustration for tourists; Ancillary services, entertainment services, commercial centers, world-class shopping areas, exhibition areas, conferences… are still lacking, not meeting the conditions for organizing large-scale events. international…”

Also at the seminar, Ms. Nguyen Thi Thuong Huyen – Deputy Director of Hai Phong Department of Tourism said: “Previously, Hai Phong focused on developing port services and industry and has achieved important development steps.

However, in recent years, along with the rapidly increasing tourism market demand and strategic orientation in the city’s economic restructuring, the tourism industry is receiving intense attention and direction to develop the tourism industry. develop into a key economic sector.

In particular, in terms of tourism product development, sea and island tourism is the core, spreading and developing sports tourism, resort, community tourism, agricultural tourism, rural tourism, cultural tourism. spirituality in order to expand the space, develop a variety of tourism products of the port city”

From practice, compared with the potential advantages and requirements for development goals, Cat Ba tourism still has many limitations compared to the major tourist centers of the country. There is no direct mechanism and policy to attract investment resources and support tourism development. This is a math problem posed with Cat Ba tourism and Hai Phong tourism in the near future.

What should Cat Ba tourism do to not miss opportunities in the breakthrough process?

Sharing about solutions to help Cat Ba tourism make the most of all resources, Mr. Nguyen Le Phuc, Deputy Director of the General Department of Tourism said: “In the coming time, Cat Ba tourism needs to focus on promoting tourism. a number of key tasks and solutions to attract tourists, including developing tourism products in the direction of diversification, exploiting the city’s advantages and potentials, connecting with associated provinces/cities. , create groups of tourism products to serve different types of visitors; develop new tourism products and improve the quality of existing tourism products:

At the same time, Cat Ba tourism needs to strengthen and promote tourism strengths, exploiting connections between Hai Phong’s tourist destinations with central provinces and especially connecting with Hanoi, Quang Ninh and other localities. other means, creating a safe tourism corridor to prolong the stay of tourists and form a package tour.

Along with that, it is necessary to have orientation and support for businesses to build attractive Cat Ba tourism products, invest in the development of amusement parks, entertainment, and auxiliary services to increase spending capacity and diversify tourism products. diversify the activities of guests when coming to Hai Phong; develop sea resort tourism, MICE tourism, golf tourism, community tourism – agro-ecology, cultural tourism – history, culture, art and cuisine on the basis of linking travel businesses. airlines, hotels, transportation and attractions; interested in developing a number of new economic models in the field of tourism such as sharing economy, night tourism economy…

Sharing with Dan Viet, Mr. Pham Van Bay – Deputy Director of Vietravel Travel Company, Hanoi branch assessed: “With its golden advantages in tourism development, Cat Ba needs to be more proactive in building infrastructure. infrastructure, promote and build their own brand on the marine tourism map.

Through the survey process, I found that Cat Ba tourism still has a situation of pulling and slashing tourists at some destinations such as the ferry wharf area or at seafood markets. In addition, inappropriately arranged signposts can also interfere with tourists in the process of visiting and experiencing when coming to Cat Ba tourism.

To solve this situation, Cat Ba tourism can implement the tourist supermarket model. Specifically, localities can list, publicly display and sell tourism products and products for customers to choose freely. This solution will limit the situation of attracting tourists, giving customers a comfortable feeling during the visit when coming to Cat Ba tourism.

Sharing his contribution in the development of Cat Ba tourism, Mr. Pham Ha – Chairman of Lux Group said that Cat Ba needs to promote regional linkages in sustainable tourism development.

Specifically: “Cat Ba tourism needs to grasp the trend of linking tourist areas in the common development process. With the advantage of owning Lan Ha Bay, one of the most beautiful bays in the world, Cat Ba tourism has can be linked with Ha Long Bay and Bai Tu Long area to create common destinations in terms of geography and tourist topography.

However, there are still limitations when tourists want to visit these two bays need to travel on two different ships. That creates difficulties for tourists and transport businesses themselves.

From that fact, I hope that Cat Ba tourism and Ha Long tourism can cooperate with each other so that tourists can experience two bays in one journey. These links can then be expanded with travel agencies, accommodation… to create new experiences for tourists during their visit to the bay, golf experience, and community tourism. … This can be a long-term direction for Cat Ba tourism in the upcoming development journey.”