Tourists plant trees in the Cần Giờ Mangrove Protective Forest. — VNA/VNS Photo Mạnh Linh |
HCM CITY — HCM City’s coastal district of Cần Giờ is focused on exploiting its tourism potential, which includes eco-tourism, homestay tourism, leisure tourism and tree planting tours to mangrove forests, according to the chairman of its People’s Committee.
Lê Minh Dũng said local authorities have worked with the city Department of Tourism to organise fam trips for travel agents to diversify its tourism products.
Trần Trọng Hưng, deputy director of the Cần Giờ Mangrove Protective Forest’s communication, environment education and eco-tourism centre, said the number of foreign tourists choosing tours that combine mangrove planting and sightseeing has been rising steadily in recent years, and numbers 5,000-6,000 a year now.
The coastal district, 60km from the city downtown, is famous for its UNESCO-listed mangrove biosphere reserve forest of 31,000ha, which is home to more than 200 species of wildlife and 150 species of flora, Vàm Sát Ecological Tourist Zone, Monkey Island, and Whale Festival.
Swallow nest and seafood farming and tropical fruit gardens are some of the district’s other advantages, Dũng said.
The number of visitors to the district has topped 700,000 so far this year, a year-on-year increase of 40 per cent, he said.
Cần Giờ eyes 1.25 million visitors this year and tourism revenues of VNĐ500 billion (US$22.02 million). — VNS