Cultural behaviors in tourism
written by seo
at Friday, May 24, 2013
Vietnam Tourism Association will deploy the methods to deal with the mayhem, to sign with the travel enterprises to ensure the quality of tourism services, universal forms of information to promote and encourage good quality facilities and services
6.8 millions of international visitors and 160,000 billions VND (more than 7.5 billions $US) of sales in 2012 are remarkable numbers in the world economic situation but tourists have not been really satisfied with the human element, the cultural behaviors.
Invitation with insistence, pushing one another, fighting each other over customers are common images in many destinations of Vietnam. Visitors are usually surrounded by a line of all kinds from beggars, pickpockets, peddlers to shoeshine men, souvenir sellers. Regardless of the time, with need or not, customers are still "bullied" for the services. The stable growth of Vietnam tourism in the last three years can be seen as a bright spot in the difficulties of the economy. However, according to the experts, Vietnam tourism development is not commensurate with its potential. According to an evaluation report on tourism competitiveness of the World Economic Forum, Vietnam tourism has the strength of culture, nature, gastronomy however tourism environment, tourism infrastructure and the services are down sides.
According to the General Statistics Office, the number of international visitors to Vietnam in nov. 2012 estimated to about 656,000 passengers and the total of that 11 months has reached 6 million, 14.4% increase compared to the same period in 2011, taken 93% percent of international passengers targeted in 2012. Many tourists and the international travel organizations in Vietnam have to admire the beauty but only 15% of them want to go back the second time.
Transport, environment and food safety have always been the specter of the international visitors to Vietnam. Never has the the phrase "tourism culture" been mentioned that much. The nature beauties, the heritages, the abundance of food can attract visitors to Vietnam but such beauties are really endless when only 15% of foreign visitors want to come back for the second time.
Besides, the bully at the destinations is an alarming situation of Vietnam's tourism. There are cases for that any one can be startled such as a vendor took 1 million VND (50$US) for the 4 pieces of a pineapple and the photography taken beside Hoan Kiem Lake. Recently, the TTR Weekly magazine of Thailand published an article entitled "The invisible hand in Hanoi Old Quarter", reflecting the fact that international tourists have been pocket-picked by vendors here . According to the article, due to language barriers and trust from tourists, many foreign tourists were deceived large sums of money by the street vendors in many different ways, meanwhile, the thieves took advantage of the crowded streets to be active. These facts are harming the reputation of Hanoi tourism so that Hanoi government has to carry out powerful solutions to stop. The article also outlines the common tricks of the street vendors in town to foreign visitors when come to Hanoi. According to Ian-Lyne, the Leader of the group "program of tourism capability for environmental responsibility and EU society": "There must be community education projects, to educate street vendors and people of small services for tourism, what tourists need and the most important is their sense of pride in their country and the city they are living in. This must be done in all localities of Vietnam ".
In the coming time, the Vietnam Tourism Association will deploy the methods to deal with the mayhem, to sign with the travel enterprises to ensure the quality of tourism services, universal forms of information to promote and encourage good quality facilities and services. Many localities have issued decisions to stabilize the prices, the Department of Finance and other relevant agencies to organize multiple inspections requiring the accommodation facilities in the area not to rise more than 50% on regular prices, to have commitment to stabilize prices and improve service quality. Some localities have established a hotline to organizations, citizens and tourists for promptly report the violations of prices, quality of services to the authorities to have timely measures.
(Source: Vietnam Tourism)
