Improving Tourism Products for Sustainable Economic

Development: A Case of Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

Huynh Tan Hoi

Department of Language, FPT University, Ho Chi Minh city, Vietnam

Keywords: Economy Development, Diversifying, Tourist Products, Tourism.

Abstract: As a large city with advantages in tourism infrastructure, Ho Chi Minh City is always considered the leading

tourist centre of the country. The most important task of city tourism today is to improve quality and diversify

products, making this industry one of the key economic sectors. Tourism potentials and advantages have not

been effectively exploited to become a unique and attractive tourism product of Ho Chi Minh City. Some

tourists seem to still only consider this as a stopover or transit point because there are large international and

domestic routes before reaching other destinations in Vietnam. Ho Chi Minh City tourism is gradually losing

this advantage when key tourist areas are completing international airports and convenient road transport

infrastructure. In addition, Ho Chi Minh City tourism has also developed over the past time, but there are not

many typical products. Therefore, before losing its advantages and its potential, Ho Chi Minh city should

focus on building a unique and diversified tourism product system to attract tourists. This paper analyses the

challenges that Ho Chi Minh City is facing and mention some recommendations. The results of the paper

through the analysis process show that the tourism industry of Ho Chi Minh City has advantages and

disadvantages that need to be overcome in order to build a more sustainable tourism brand.

1 INTRODUCTION

Being a modern city with strong growth in many

aspects as well as an important international trade

gateway of the region and the country, Ho Chi Minh

City is always a destination for many international

tourists to choose when coming to Vietnam.

However, in order to retain long-term tourists to learn

and discover the unique identities of local people in a

methodical and profound way, the tourism industry of

the city still has many things to do (Ryan, 2002).

According to statistics of the Ho Chi Minh City

Department of Tourism, in 2020, international

visitors to the city are 1,303,750 arrivals, down 84.8%

over the same period in 2019, reaching 14.49% of the

2020 plan. Domestic tourism to Ho Chi Minh City

was 15,879,000 arrivals, down 51.5% over the same

period in 2019, reaching 46.7% of the plan in 2020.

The total revenue of the tourism industry reached

84,512 billion VND (a decrease of 39, 6% over the

same period in 2019), reaching 57.4% of the plan for

2020. However, it is due to the Covid-19 epidemic,

the city has had a pretty good growth compared to

https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3505-5290

compared with the years 2000, 2020 or past years

(Fan et al., 2019).

2 METHODOLOGY

The paper is based on sources and data gathered

during doing the research, then, the data were

analysed and compared. The article also analyses

survey results from 40 people who work in the

tourism industry. The survey was conducted to gather

their opinions as well as their proposed solutions. The

results of this survey are then used in research to

assess the importance of diversifying and improving

the quality of tourism products and services. For the

questionnaire samples, the random sampling method

was selected so that all participants were equally

likely to participate in the sample. At the same time,

to ensure sample reliability, the interview questions

were conducted in different locations and at different

times.

Huynh, T.

Improving Tourism Products for Sustainable Economic Development: A Case of Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.

DOI: 10.5220/0010591304010406

In Proceedings of the International Scientiﬁc and Practical Conference on Sustainable Development of Regional Infrastructure (ISSDRI 2021), pages 401-406

ISBN: 978-989-758-519-7

401

3 RESULTS

The first seven months of 2018, TP. Ho Chi Minh

City welcomes nearly 4.4 million international

tourists. Contributing to that result, the city tourism

industry has focused on researching and developing

different types of tourism products, associated with

history, culture and architecture in the area such as

shopping tourism, MICE tourism (conference

tourism), food, river travel, etc.

River tourism is considered a typical product of

the city. Ho Chi Minh City has not been properly

exploited with its available potential and

geographical advantages. The City Department of

Tourism has coordinated with the Department of

Transport to implement the program of developing

and improving waterway traffic, serving tourism

(Gia, 2021).

Through the survey, most say the destinations are

interesting (50%), but only 27.5% say "very

interesting". This implies that tourism products are

still not attractive enough for tourists. From the

perspective of an activist in the tourism industry, but

specifically tour guides, tourism products need to be

further improved so that visitors will come back and

experience them again and again. There are a few

"Rather Interesting" options (20%), which needs to be

rethought as the tourism product needs to be perfect

to attract tourists, especially the fastidious ones

(Figure 1).

Figure 1: Respondents' assessment of the attractiveness of

tourism products in Ho Chi Minh City.

Some of the respondents (30%) also mention the

option “more good products”, that is, the outstanding

product play a rather important role. Tourism

promotion and promotion activities are large,

invested in content, in-depth, specialized for each

market segment and bring high efficiency (27.5%).

Many activities to link domestic and foreign tourism

development cooperation have been effectively

implemented (Mai et al., 2019). The development of

new tourism products and forms and improving the

quality of tourism services that are interested in have

significantly contributed to attracting tourists,

creating many impressions of visitors when coming

to Ho Chi Minh City (Phuong and Khuong, 2017).

Figure 2: Solutions to develop tourism.

In the above factors, the tour guide is seen as an

ambassador. They are the ones who bring the image

of the country to international tourists. For that

reason, they also need to cultivate more professional

skills and knowledge (Figure 2).

4 DISCUSSION

4.1 Current Status of the Tourism

Industry of Ho Chi Minh City

Tourism activities in Ho Chi Minh City are quite

active. Here, there are 669 travel agencies, including

357 international travel agencies, 312 domestic travel

agencies and eight representative offices of foreign

travel agencies. Many businesses have strong

capabilities and have built reputable brands in the

country and in the world such as Saigon Tourist, Ben

Thanh Tourist, Hoa Binh Tourism, Vietravel,

Fiditourist, VYC, Vidotour, Apex, Exotossimo, YTC,

etc.

Facilities for tourists staying here are also very

rich. In the city, there are 1,527 tourist

accommodation establishments with 35,000 659

rooms of all kinds, including 860 one-star to five-star

hotels, with 25,000 737 rooms. There are 13 five-star

hotels, including New World, Sheraton, Park Hyatt,

Caravelle, Rex, Majestic, Movempik, Sofitel,

Legend, InterContinental, Renaissance, Equatorial,

Windsor Plaza; one six-star hotel. In the near future,

27,50%

50%

20%

2,50%

Very interesting

Intersting

Rather

interesting

Not interesting

30%

27,50%

25%

17,50%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

More good

products

Good tour

guides

Marketing

activities

invesment

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402

there will be other five-star hotel in this city. As a

result, every year, more than three million

international visitors come to the city, creating

favorable conditions for the industry to achieve

revenue of more than 40 trillion Vietnam dong

(VND) per year (Phuong and Khuong, 2017).

Figure 3: Flower Street Festival in Ho Chi Minh city.

In order to improve service quality, the city's

tourism industry has constantly invested in upgrading

and building many new hotels and restaurants. In

2010, Saigon Tourist, a private tourist company, put

into use quite new and modern hotels. Some other

hotels have been upgraded and expanded (Phuong &

Khuong, 2017). Although there are not many

monuments and landscapes in Ho Chi Minh City, the

tourism industry of the city has sought to exploit its

strengths in cultural activities such as festivals,

festivals, fairs, especially culinary culture and travel

events. Domestic and foreign tourists are quite

impressed with travel events such as Nguyen Hue

Flower Street, Tourism Festival, Southern Fruit

Festival, Southern Land Food Festival, etc. (Figure

3).

Figure 4: Jade Emperor Pagoda in Ho Chi Minh city.

The industry used to focuse on developing four

key tourism products. The first is the program "Ho

Chi Minh City - 100 interesting things", the focus is

on consulting experts and consultants to contribute to

the expansion of 20 criteria of the 2011 program

(Figure 4). The second product is a standard travel

service program aimed at building good shopping

spots to introduce to tourists. To date, the city has

more than 100 standard tourist service spots. The

third product is an art performance program for

tourists. Types such as circus, martial arts are

exploited, from historical events and from unique

cultural features of Vietnam. In addition, a number of

other art units also participate in performing to serve

tourists but have not been closely linked with the

Citytour programs of travel companies. The product

with the strongest growth potential and the most

promising results is the river cruise program (Tuan, &

Rajagopal, 2019).

4.2 Some Shortcomings of the Tourism

Industry in Ho Chi Minh City

The tourism environment of the city still has many

shortcomings, especially security issues for tourists.

Many street vendors, beggars, lottery ticket sellers,

shoe shineers, etc. They often disturb customers

without guarantee of quality, causing discomfort for

visitors. The most serious is the situation of robbery

of property, stealing money carried out by a number

of taxi, cyclo, and motorbike taxi. Therefore, the

tourism industry needs to closely coordinate the city

police, especially the special forces and other

functional departments and agencies to restore order

and safety in this field to build a city tourism

environment. safe, friendly and civilized.

In fact, every time there are visitors from other

regions or foreigners visiting, tourist companies

usually take them to traditional sightseeing places

such as Ben Thanh Market, War Remnants Museum,

Independence Palace, Dragon House Museum, Ho

Chi Minh City Post Office, Cu Chi Tunnels, etc. In

the minds of those who were born and raised in this

City, of course, these are places that have been

"assigned" as destinations-places tourist must visit.

Everyone can easily see the familiar destinations

mentioned above. Foreign visitors come to Ho Chi

Minh City to stay and it takes them just 1-2 days to be

able to explore all the sights in the city. The rest of

the time is spent on shopping, transfer and

accommodation to other provinces and cities

(Phuong, 2019).

Tourists often like to discover new places and new

things, however, in order to find a place to experience

Improving Tourism Products for Sustainable Economic Development: A Case of Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

403

the extremely diverse and rich culture and arts of the

Vietnamese people in the City, it is still difficult. To

find a place for international tourists to experience the

culture. admire, admire is really not easy. This is a

void that city tourism has not fully exploited.

City tourism regulators also admitted that the city

still does not have a fixed, large-scale performing arts

venue (while most countries in the ASEAN region

have performance centers over 1,000 guests. ), and

there are no high-quality arts programs to serve the

entertainment needs of tourists during their stay in the

city (Truong, 2013).

The current entertainment activities are not

attractive or commercially exploited through the

forms of bars, beer clubs, karaoke, etc. and sometimes

there are changes; There is no entertainment product

suitable for a modern, dynamic and international city

(Ryan, 2002).

4.3 Promising Potentials

One of the current important tasks of the city tourism

industry is to focus on developing river tourism in the

direction of Can Gio, a coastal district with great

potential for ecotourism. Located 50 km from the city

center by bird-flying with an area of more than 70,000

400 hectares (one third of the whole city), Can Gio

has a coastline of more than 20 km and a mangrove

area of more than 37,160 hectares (accounting for

more than half of the total area of the district). With

about 12,000 hectares of natural forest and more than

20,000 hectares of planted forest, Can Gio mangrove

ecosystem has recovered and developed well,

recognized by UNESCO as the first " mangrove

biosphere reserve area " of Vietnam (Lai et al., 2009).

Figure 5: A boat trip along the river.

This is truly the "green lung" of the city, which is

especially important in regulating the climate.

Coming to Can Gio, visitors will have a feeling of

refreshment and relief when returning to nature

because surrounded by immense forests of all kinds

of trees, especially mangroves (Figure 5). The

mangrove fauna here is also of high value in terms of

biodiversity conservation with more than 200 species

of animals, including 24 species of reptile

amphibians, birds and other animals. In particular, the

Can Gio mangrove forest has up to 11 species of

reptiles on the red list of the country. Another

attractive feature of Can Gio is the intertwined river

and canal system (accounting for nearly one third of

the whole district's area), so sailing under the lush

green forests will create a distinctive feature of

regional tourism (Kuenzer and Tuan, 2013).

There is another interesting thing, that is, the

characteristic feature of Can Gio culture is the Nghinh

Ong festival (Whale welcome festival), which takes

place every year on the occasion of the Mid-Autumn

Festival, attracting many tourists to visit, play and

entertain. This festival is being researched and

upgraded to a city-scale cultural and tourist festival.

Can Gio also has three unique traditional craft

villages. These are concentrated forest villages in

Tam Thon Hiep and An Thoi Dong of Can Gio

district area.

However, in order to successfully implement the

river tourist route in the direction of Can Gio, there

are many things to do, especially building

infrastructure (Kuenzer and Tuan, 2013). The first

thing is to focus investment in the construction of key

projects to serve tourism, improve Can Gio marine

eco-tourism area, embellish Can Gio coastal urban

area (600 ha). In addition, the construction of bridges

to connect with the city center should also be focused.

In addition, it is also necessary to develop a network

of markets, supermarkets, trade centers, and business

establishments, food service, accommodation,

ecological garden model combined with tourism;

specialties serving tourists are also quite important.

5 SUGGESTIONS

From real requirements, a number of solutions to

develop tourism products to increase the

attractiveness and competitiveness of the tourism

sector are proposed, focusing on the development of

unique and multi diversify the product system,

improve the quality of tourism products and services,

develop human resources and promote promotion of

tourism products (Mai et al., 2019).

First, it is necessary to clearly define the specific

tourism products of the region to create highlights and

brands for city tourism (Phuong, 2019). With its

unique cultural values, Ho Chi Minh City should

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404

focus resources on the development of cultural

tourism products to become specific products, and at

the same time develop supplementary products to

increase the endowed with product systems (Tuan, &

Rajagopal, 2019).

Next, the development of tourism products

associated with the target tourist market should be

focused (Gia, 2021). Product development must be

appropriate to each target market, therefore, we need

to have effective market promotion strategies and

plans. The markets identified in Ho Chi Minh City are

international tourist markets (including international

tourists and overseas Vietnamese), domestic tourists

(Vietnamese and foreign tourists) in addition to live

in Vietnam).

In addition, it is necessary to develop a system of

tourism products with high integration, that is, we

need to link main tourism products with

complementary products to create synthetic products

that bring high added value. Some links can be

created such as culture - ecology - resort; ecology -

resort; culture -entertainment; resort - entertainment;

MICE - culture – entertainment,etc.

It is necessary to focus on investment and

development to build national tourist resorts and key

tourist spots in accordance with the proposed plan to

create a highlight product for city tourism (Fan et al.,

2019). Of course, we need to invest in the

development of the tourism infrastructure system,

which is essential to develop the accommodation

system suitable for each type of tourism product to

meet the diverse needs of tourists; that is, we need to

develop a system of standard restaurants serving

tourists, ensuring the diversity of cuisines and

emphasizing the culinary introduction of the city; to

develop a system of synchronous technical and

material foundations in service of tourists; to build

entertainment works, theaters, and convention and

exhibition centers of international and national scale

and stature. Transport systems need to be upgraded

and invested, the high-quality tourist transportation

system should be safe, environmentally friendly and

friendly with the disabled (Tuan, & Rajagopal, 2019).

In order to improve the quality of tourism

products, we should develop a set of standards for

assessing the quality of tourism products (regulations

for accommodation establishments, tourist

attractions, dining establishments, souvenir

establishments, tour operators, and transporting

tourists) and apply for the whole city (Truong, 2013).

The solution to promote the market, promote

tourism products also need to be focused (Gia, 2021).

We need to develop plans to promote and attract

international tourists in phases and suitable to each

key market; actively participate in international

tourism promotion activities; building tourist

information systems (websites, maps, guides, tourist

information counters, leaflets, etc.) convenient,

diversifying information, in major international

languages; build programs to promote Hanoi tourism

to international (advertise on foreign travel

magazine/TV channels, participate in major

international travel events, promote Ho Chi Minh

tourism in events) international events, etc.).

However, the domestic tourism market also needs to

be focused, from there, we need to build a suitable

tourism product that attracts domestic tourists and has

policies to stimulate demand for the domestic market

(Truong, 2013).

Last but not least, it is the solution to develop

tourism human resources. Tourism human resources

with high professional expertise and good

professional ethics need to be invested (Hoi, 2020).

To do this, we need to give priority to developing the

system of tourism vocational training schools in the

city; strengthen professional training programs,

tourism management skills, and disseminate the city's

sustainable tourism development policy to the staff of

the tourism industry. Local forces of tour guides need

more thorough training in both relevant skills and

knowledge (Gia, 2021).

6 CONCLUSION

In the context of the COVID-19 epidemic there are

still unpredictable developments in many parts of the

world, tourism - the general economy is certainly

facing many challenges. However, with efforts to find

opportunities right in difficulties, synchronously

implementing solutions to promote links, creating

highlights from each locality's advantages, enhancing

the application of information technology in

construction, promoting tourism products and

activities of Vietnam in general and Ho Chi Minh

City in particular will have more prospects.

CONFLICT OF INTEREST

There is no conflict of interest in the paper.

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