Vietnam Tourism Forum in India, organised by Vietnam Tourism Ministry, in New Delhi saw a good turnout ( Photo : India Outbound)
Boosted by the rapid growth in the number of Indian visitors headed to Vietnam ever since the destination to Indian tourists, Vietnam Tourism organised its first in-person meeting in India to engage with the Indian travel trade stakeholders.
The Vietnam Tourism Forum in India was organised by Vietnam Tourism Ministry, in association with the Vietnamese Embassy in New Delhi and the PHDCCI, a chamber of commerce, in New Delhi on Wednesday.
Delivering the keynote address at the meeting, which saw an enthusiastic participation by Indian travel trade stakeholders, Hoang Dao Cuong, Vietnam’s Vice Minister for Culture, Sports & Tourism said that India would be one of the key focus markets for Vietnam in 2023. He said that in the first 11 months of the current year, the country had already received over 110,000 Indian travellers, making India one of the fastest growing source markets for the country in the post-pandemic scenario.
‘‘To build on the momentum, Vietnam Tourism will significantly enhance its engagement in India in 2023, with activities not just in New Delhi, but across the country and focused on key segments in order that updated information is available to the Indian travel trade which in turn can create awareness about the various activities and destinations that would be appealing for Indian travellers,’’ Cuong told the gathering.
After the plenary session, the Forum saw organisation of several focused panel discussions, with indepth discussion on Vietnam’s offerings in key segments like honeymoon, family, luxury, destination wedding and MICE.
‘‘We expect the strong growth from India to continue and even accelerate next year, thanks to our continued engagement with the market and in 2023, we are targetting at least 1 million Indian tourists to visit Vietnam,’’ Cuong told India Outbound.
‘‘Since we have a wide variety of experiences for Indian travellers, we are mainly targetting the Indian middle class to visit Vietnam for honeymoon, leisure and other activities. But, since we have several premium properties as well, we will also target the luxury clients from India,’’ Cuong added.
To deepen the engagement with the Indian travel trade, Vietnam Tourism will organise many more events in 2023. ‘‘We will rapidly increase our presence in the Indian market and next year we will organise many more events to share information with the Indian travel trade. These events will be held not only in New delhi, but all across the country,’’ Nguyen Thanh Hai, Ambassador of Vietnam to India told India Outbound.
Veteran of Indian travel trade, Rajan Sehgal, who was one the persons instrumental behind the organisation of the Vietnam Tourism Forum says that the next step would be to deepen the engagement. ‘‘What we want to do next year is to organise focused discussions and workshops on various sectors so that stakeholders from both the countries can share information and develop the Indian market accordingly,’’ Sehgal told India Outbound.
The Vietnamese stakeholders present at the forum said that the meeting was extremely fruitful and illuminating for them. One such person was Nguyen Thi Thanh Nhan, Director of Sales of VinWonders, part of USD 5.5 billion VinGroup, the largest conglomerate in Vietnam which has an extensive footprint in tourism and hospitality where it is also the largest player. Nhan says that she was glad that she came from Hanoi to New Delhi for the Forum.
‘‘I was already excited to come to India as this is my first visit and I also realised that not many people knew about Vin Group and our offerings in tourism. And I also wanted to understand how the Indian tourism market works and what are the special needs and desires that Indian travellers look out for. So, this morning, I have had very detailed discussions with lots of Indian travel trade partners and now I understand the market much better,’’ Nhan tells India Outbound.
