Saturday, 31 May 2008

Indochina countries to be featured as single tourist destination

30/05/2008

VietNamNet Bridge – Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia will be promoted as a single destination for international tourists at an upcoming tourism exhibition in HCMC, said a senior local tourism official.

HCMC Department of Tourism director Dong Thi Kim Vui said city tourism officials came to Laos and Cambodia last week to discuss co-operation in the common promotion scheme.

This is part of the annual International Travel Expo HCMC 2008, or ITE 2008, which is scheduled for September 12 to 14 in the city.

"Like the last fair, we've agreed to promote the three Indochina countries as a single destination," said Vui, who led the HCMC tourism mission to the two neighboring countries.
Like the previous editions, the fourth fair in Phu Tho Exhibition Center in District 11 will feature a tourism exhibition, meetings between travel buyers and sellers, free-show tours and seminars.

La Quoc Khanh, deputy director of the city's tourism department, told the Daily that the city would also host an ASEM (the Asia-Europe Meeting) Tourism Meeting two days before the opening of the fair.

Tourism officials from 39 countries in Asia and Europe will come to HCMC for the September 10 to 11 meeting, and visit ITE 2008.

The fair organizer will also put on ITE Friendship Golf Tournament for fair participants, foreign buyers, and local sellers.

"The special event will help promote the image of ITE worldwide. The seller will have the opportunity to meet these participants for business connection," Khanh said.

He said the organizer this year would invite Myanmar to join the fair as a guest country, aiming to open up ITE to all countries in the Mekong Sub-region.

According to the co-organizer Binet & IIR Exhibitions Pte Ltd, the organizing committee has invited the same number of foreign buyers as last year to join the fair, or around 100 buyers.

The organizer will be inviting around 150 foreign buyers from 25 countries to join the event.

The third annual fair last year attracted 180 local and foreign exhibitors and 101 foreign buyers.

The exhibitors who were travel companies, destination and service providers organized 62 programs to promote destinations and products to both buyers and customers.

In ITE 2007, the tourism ministers of Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia inked a joint declaration on tourism cooperation to make the three countries a common destination for international tourists.

(Source: SGT)

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