Inbound tourism soars by 46% in 8 months
VGP - Viet Nam welcomed nearly 11.4 million international holiday-makers in the first eight months of this year, up 46 percent year-on-year and 1 percent compared to the same period in 2019 before the COVID-19 pandemic broke out, the General Statistics Office (GSO) reported.
Of them, arrivals by air account for 84.7 per cent (9.7 million), 13.8 per cent by road (1.6 million) and 1.5 per cent by sea (165,600).
In August alone, the country lured nearly 1.43 million foreign arrivals, an increase of 18 over the same period last year.
In January-August, Asia remained Viet Nam's largest tourist source market with over 9 million arrivals, a year-on-year increase of 51 percent.
Arrivals from the EU and Oceania continued to grow steadily, respectively up 42.7 percent (over 1.3 million visitors) and 25.4 percent (346,500 visitors).
The number of tourists from Africa grew by 95.5 percent to 34,200, from the Americas up by 7.8 percent to 674,300.
South Korea and China maintained their status as Viet Nam's largest sources of tourists with over 3 million (making up 26 percent) and 2.4 million (accounting for 21 percent), respectively.
It was followed by Taiwan with 850,000; the U.S. 529,000; Japan 461,000; Australia 315,000; Malaysia 313,000; India 312,000; Cambodia 295,000 and Thailand 274,000.
Favorable visa policies and attractive tourism stimulus programs in many localities were attributed to the rising number of foreign visitors to Viet Nam, according to the GSO.
Viet Nam has introduced its visa policy since August 15, 2023, helping the local tourism industry to gradually recover from the staggering impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Accordingly, it has applied electronic visas (e-visa) to citizens of all countries and territories, and increased the temporary residence period from 30 to 90 days, with multiple entries and exits. It has also increased the temporary stay period of citizens from 13 countries with unilateral visa exemption to 45 days./.
