VNAT’s Chairman Nguyen Trung Khanh at the meeting (Photo: TITC)

At the meeting, VNAT’s Chairman Nguyen Trung Khanh said, in 2024, Viet Nam welcomed 17.6 million international visitor arrivals, marking a 40% year-on-year increase, 110 million domestic visitors, with total receipts from tourists of 34.5 billion US dollars. Viet Nam tourism set the 2025 goal to welcome 22 - 23 million international arrivals, serve 120 - 130 million domestic visitors; total tourist receipts reach around 38.6 - 41.4 billion US dollars.

Regarding the cooperation plan in the future, he proposed PATA to consider the organisation of meetings, conferences, events, campaigns related to the tourism field in Viet Nam. VNAT will also discuss with several localities in Viet Nam about the possibility of hosting some PATA events in the country.

PATA’s CEO Noor Ahmad Hamid speaking at the meeting (Photo: TITC)

PATA’s CEO Noor Ahmad Hamid stressed the effective cooperation between the two sides and informed that PATA has coordinated to organize many activities, especially training activities for Vietnamese tourism workforce. According to PATA’s CEO Noor Ahmad Hamid, Viet Nam embraces a huge potential in tourism, the tourism industry is recovering and growing rapidly, with convenient air connections, excellent facilities and accommodation, meeting the diverse demands of tourists.

Mr. Noor Ahmad Hamid affirmed that PATA will continue to cooperate with Viet Nam in capacity building for labourers, business managers, tourism training establishments... with a network of more than 60 professional international trainers. At the same time, PATA is also willing to share with Viet Nam statistics, data, and reports on the tourism industry; support the design and organization of appropriate tourism promotion events and programmes in Viet Nam; coordinate the organization of famtrips for buyers in accordance with market demands; encourage Vietnamese enterprises to join PATA membership. PATA’s CEO Noor Ahmad Hamid hopes that Viet Nam will attend the PATA Travel Summit 2025 in Istanbul, Turkey and PATA Travel Mart 2025 in Thailand.

Overview of the meeting (Photo: TITC)

Leaders taking souvenir photo (Photo: TITC)

On the same day, leaders of the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and Viet Nam National Authority of Tourism had a luncheon session with the US-ASEAN Business Council (US-ABC). During this luncheon, the U.S's leading companies from the travel and tourism sector shared recommendations on how the U.S private sector can further support ASEAN as a tourism destination, particularly considering the post-ASEAN Tourism Strategic Plan (ATSP) 2016-2025 agenda.

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