New tours, such as Sài Gòn River tour, are chosen by many tourists. — VNA/VNS Photo

HCM CITY — For the first nine months of 2023, tourism has been one of the key economic sectors of HCM City with many of the industry's goals set at the beginning of the year having almost been achieved.

The city earned VNĐ125.5 trillion (US$5.1 billion) in revenue from tourism from January through September, an increase of 35.8 per cent over the same period last year.

It welcomed nearly 27 million domestic visitors, up 24.9 per cent year-on-year, and about 3.6 million foreign visitors, a 69 per cent increase.

The number of passengers travelling to and from the city by air and train increased 37 per cent and 53 per cent, respectively. The volume of public passenger transport increased by 22.8 per cent to around 300 million passengers.

"The tourism industry's revenue is a very important contributor to the city's economy. Therefore, this year, we set a target for the industry's revenue to reach VNĐ160 trillion, 10-15 per cent higher than 2019. We expect this year's tourism revenue to achieve the set targets and have breakthroughs in the last months of the year and before the Lunar New Year holiday," Lê Trương Hiền Hòa, deputy director of city's Department of Tourism, said.

The above stats show that the city has been able to attract tourists and gradually recover its tourism industry after the COVID-19 pandemic.

In 2019, the city welcomed over 8.6 million international visitors and 32.8 million domestic tourists with total revenue of over VNĐ140 trillion.

However, at the beginning of the 2021 - 2026 term, the growth of the city's tourism was almost zero due to the pandemic.

It seemed that the city's tourism would take a long time to recover, but, in reality, it happened quickly.

When the pandemic was controlled, the city embraced opening back up and gradually restored safe tourism.

After the pandemic, in order to attract more tourists, the city's tourism industry immediately launched the programme "Welcome to HCM City” and “Each district has at least one attractive tourism destination”.

The city's tourism authority has cooperated with relevant agencies to survey and create many new tours and routes to upgrade and bring new experiences to tourists.

Local tourist sites such as Bến Thành Market, Sài Gòn Central Post Office, and the War Remnants Museum have been favoured among the visitors.

Currently, domestic and foreign tourists coming to HCM City can select new tours, such as a helicopter tour over HCM City, and the Sài Gòn River tour to watch the sunset and see the beauty of the city at night.

Many foreign tourists are interested in discovering the beauty of the Sài Gòn River. To facilitate the travel of passengers, the city authority has deployed three tram lines that connect quickly from the Bạch Đằng wharf to tourist landmarks in the city.

By 2025, it aims to develop at least 10 waterway tours and programmes linking seaports and river routes.

The city is striving to welcome about 500,000 visitors a year to the waterway tourism programmes in the 2023-24 period, and increase this number by 10 per cent in the following years

In addition, suburban districts are also promoting the development of agri-l and eco-tourism.

For example, Cần Giờ is the only district of HCM City that has 23km of coastline, an immense network of rivers and a unique mangrove ecosystem that provides the locality with a cool and fresh climate year round.

Going to Cần Giờ ecotourism area, visitors can mingle with nature and enjoy wonderful landscapes.

Củ Chi District is also considered the green space of the city, suitable for developing ecotourism and garden tourism.

When visiting the district, tourists can visit the orchard gardens along the Sài Gòn River, green farms, high-tech agricultural areas and the Củ Chi guerrilla-warfare tunnels, or try to work as a farmer for one day in the gardens.

Director of the municipal Department of Tourism Nguyễn Thị Ánh Hoa said in order to attract more visitors, the city will survey the market to develop its tourism brand, while enhancing communications campaigns to popularise its images both locally and internationally.

The city is now focusing on developing more types of entertainment tourism, cuisine and services at night to create many new and unique tourism products to meet the increasing needs of tourists.

Also, the city continues to focus on the development of healthcare and wellness, and waterway tourism offerings, which have great development potential and bring in much revenue for the city.

The city's Department of Tourism has worked with 50 units, including hospitals, healthcare facilities, spas, travel companies and accommodation facilities to create 30 unique service packages that combine healthcare with visiting famous destinations to meet the needs of tourists.

In addition, with Việt Nam's new visa policy since August, the number of foreign tourists is expected to continue to increase, especially in the last months of the year - the peak period of tourism. — VNS