Leaders of two ministries signed a Coordination program to develop effective and sustainable agricultural and rural tourism for the period 2024 - 2030. Photo: TITC

Initial steps to promote and harness agricultural and rural tourism

Mr. Nguyen Le Phuc - Vice Chairman of Vietnam National Authority of Tourism (VNAT) informed at the seminar that VNAT coordinated with the Central Office on New Rural Coordination and Directorate of Fisheries (under MARD) to organize some conferences and forums to guide the implementation of the Program on rural tourism development in building new rural areas for the period 2021 – 2025.

VNAT has coordinated to organize seminars to discuss policy mechanisms for developing the farmstay tourism model; agricultural and rural tourism real estate business; training courses on applying ASEAN Tourism Standards.

In addition, VNAT has developed multimedia documents introducing tourist attractions, relics, traditional craft villages... associated with rural tourism development; videos introducing rural tourism on the Youtube; promote rural tourism on social networking platforms and specialized rural tourism promotion website nongthon.vietnamtourism.gov.vn.

Currently, many localities exploit their strengths in traditional cultural values, agricultural production activities, local specialties, natural landscapes, festivals, traditional craft villages, cuisine... to serve visitors. Some tourism activities interwoven with other types of community, cultural, ecological, craft village tourism... are especially strongly developed in the Northern midland and mountainous region, the Mekong Delta, and the Central Highlands. A number of tourism villages are evaluated and recognized according to OCOP criteria, ASEAN standards, World's Best Tourist Villages…

Provinces focused on developing agricultural and rural tourism associated with consumption of agricultural products, especially OCOP products in order to attract more visitors and increase visitor spending.

Going to the field on New Year holidays in Hoi An is an unforgettable experience for foreign tourists.Photo: Quang Nam News

According to Mr. Ngo Truong Son - Chief of Central Office on New Rural Coordination, developing rural tourism is one of the key solutions and tasks of National Target Program on building new rural areas for the period 2021 - 2025, based on changing thinking from agricultural production to rural economic development.

MARD organized conference on developing agricultural tourism models and human resources; Issue training documents to develop agricultural and rural community tourism models in building new rural areas in Vietnam. Up to now, there were 584 agricultural and rural tourism models operating and included in local support plans. 58/63 provinces/cities have issued plans to deploy rural tourism development in new rural construction according to Decision No. 922/QD-TTg of the Prime Minister.

At the seminar, leaders of Departments and units of the two ministries discussed, shared and pointed out difficulties in developing rural tourism. Delegates also proposed directions and solutions for development in the coming time, emphasizing the element of cultural connection in agricultural and rural tourism development.

Opening a new state for agricultural and rural tourism development

Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism Mr. Nguyen Van Hung emphasized that agricultural and rural tourism has good room for development if the two sectors coordinate effectively.

Minister Nguyen Van Hung said that agricultural tourism products originate from the depth of indigenous culture, village community culture, along with achievements in agriculture and rural areas to create attractive tourism products.

For example, terraced fields not only bring food to people, but also show the traditional culture of how to grow rice, how to make terraced fields, and the culture of indigenous people in the highlands and create stunning landscapes. Or the idyllic flower villages have become famous attractions such as the Red Poinciana Flower Festival (Hai Phong), the Ban flower festival (Northwest mountains), the buckwheat flower fields (Ha Giang)…

The Minister emphasized the need to strengthen close links between tourism and travel businesses and residential communities in addition to preserving and promoting traditional cultural values, blowing the cultural soul into tourism products.

Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Mr. Le Minh Hoan said that it is necessary to expand the space of the national tourism map, adding more rural areas, intangible heritage, sediments... The Minister expects that agricultural and rural tourism will help increase economic value in agriculture, bring greater benefits to farmers, and shift thinking from production to economic development basing on agricultural tourism.

On this occasion, the leaders of two ministries signed a Coordination Program to develop effective and sustainable agricultural and rural tourism for the period 2024 - 2030.

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