Hue tourism rich in potential, lacking in execution: Vietnam’s Deputy PM
Hue tourism rich in potential, lacking in execution: Vietnam’s Deputy PM
Although the central city of Hue has a lot to offer tourists, local experts and officials have admitted that the city fails to capitalize on the full potential of the former imperial capital.
“The tourism potential of Hue is enormous, but the industry hinders itself by its lack of execution,” Deputy Prime Minister Vuong Dinh Hue said when chairing a tourism development and investment promotion conference in Hue City on Monday.
“This is mainly due to the lack of diversity in services and tourism products,” he stated.
Tran Bac Ha, board chairman of the Bank for Investment and Development of Vietnam, a strategic sponsor of Hue’s tourism development, said that the city’s tourism potential is exclusive and outstanding, but promoting tourism on its own is not enough.
He insisted that the city should not be seen solely as the property of Hue but an asset of the whole country to boost the national tourism industry.
Agreeing with Ha, Tran Dinh Thien, head of the Vietnam Institute of Economics, said that one of the main factors hindering Hue’s tourism is a human resource shortage, the lack of strong entrepreneurial investment and talented people, suggesting that the whole country ought to invest in the imperial capital in order to utilize its full potential.
Sharing his perspectives with the experts, the deputy prime minister urged local authorities and related units to come up with strategies and explicit policies to attract dedicated investors to develop the city’s tourism.
Nguyen Van Cao, chairman of the Thua Thien-Hue Province People’s Committee, said that there are two main goals that the province has aimed to achieve, including turning Hue into a green city of heritage and forming a central coastal city chain comprising Da Nang, Hue, and the urban areas of the Lang Co - Chan May economic zone.
Previously, Hue City, which is the capital of Thua Thien-Hue, marked the country’s first entry into the World Wildlife Fund’s Earth Hour City Challenge and took home the title of National Earth Hour Capital 2016 in late June.
The Earth Hour City Challenge, which is in its fifth year, is a WWF initiative calling on cities around the globe to take action for a climate-friendly future by developing and rolling out ambitious plans to mitigate and adapt to climate change.
