Delta plans tourist quadrangle

A five-year master plan that aims to form a tourism quadrangle in Cuu Long (Mekong) Delta is being developed by the provinces of An Giang and Kien Giang and the cities of Ca Mau and Can Tho.
"The plan is being drawn up because the industry needs co-operation between the Viet Nam National Administration of Tourism, tourist businesses and tourist business associations," said Dr Do Cam Tho of the Tourism Development Institute under the Ministry of Culture, Sport and Tourism.
The goal of the master plan, which covers the 2010-15 period with a vision towards 2025, is to develop the region’s socio-economic, cultural and tourism development. Officials from those localities have been working together to upgrade or build new tourist infrastructure as well as encourage other economic sectors to invest in the industry.
Under the master plan, each locality would place an emphasis on its own tourist features that are not similar to others.
Joint activities
Businesses and national tourism promotion agencies must co-ordinate activities for the industry to prosper, Tho said.
Other joint activities include training personnel, building a tourism promotion centre and websites, and improving the quality of tourism products and services.
Under the plan, Kien Giang province’s Phu Quoc island, known for world-class beaches, is slated to become an international-standard eco-tourism area.
The draft plan for the island calls for luxury entertainment services, five-star hotels, casinos, conference halls, exhibition and trade centres, training centres and centres for advanced scientific research.
Also planned are duty-free zones for air and sea ports, craft villages and a centre for hi-tech agricultural production for tourism.
Officials working on the master plan said infrastructure in the quadrangle area, including bridges, roads, airports and ferries, needed to be upgraded or newly built.
More three to five-star hotels and attractive recreational facilities should be built, they said.
Tourism products were still poor and very few craft villages attracted foreign visitors, officials said.
The Cuu Long (Mekong) Delta welcomes about 3.5 million tourists every year.
The quadrangle of An Giang, Kien Giang, Ca Mau and Can Tho employs 3,000 people in the tourism sector, but only 50 per cent have received formal training.
To meet the increasing demand of tourism in the region, the Delta needs at least 10,000 employees, and they should be professionally trained, according to the Viet Nam National Administration of Tourism.