Ho Chi Minh City introduce river tourism in Singapore

HCMC will attend the Singapore Yacht Show 2014 for the first time in April to promote its river tourism which is expected to become a major tourism product of the city.

Enterprises and the tourism promotion agency in HCMC will attend the annual show in Singapore from April 8-13 to establish relations with partners as well as introducing the city’s river tourism, said Nguyen Bao Anh, deputy director of the HCMC Tourism Promotion Center.

“The city is improving the product and thus needs to promote it both overseas and locally,” he said.

HCMC has almost finished handing over the site of Bach Dang Wharf in District 1 to Saigontourist Holding Company to make it a terminal for tourist boats. The city has also released a list of wharfs, piers and stations in districts 1, 8, 9, Cu Chi and Can Gio to call for investment.

Before infrastructure facilities and services for the new product are completed, river tours departing from Bach Dang Wharf to Binh Quoi, District 8 and Long An have been offered to tourists.

According to Anh, together with the show in Singapore, HCMC is preparing for a tourism promotion roadshow to be organized in Japan in April. This time HCMC will not promote tourism individually but with Myanmar, Laos, Thailand and Cambodia.

This year the HCMC Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism will coordinate with Japanese partners to hold a tourism forum which will have the participation of around 40 Japanese enterprises who are interested in the Vietnamese market.

The number of Japanese tourists coming to HCMC was over 345,000 last year, up 10%, and is expected to rise to half a million in 2015.