Contemporary Challenges for Ecotourism in Vietnam

Abstract

With a rapidly growing domestic and international tourism industry, the government of Vietnam has taken a number of tourism-related initiatives since early 1999. These include the issuing of an Ordinance on Tourism, which provides the legal and policy foundations for developing tourism with due regard for conserving biodiversity and ensuring social, cultural, and environmental sustainability, and the proposal to revise the existing Tourism Development Master Plan to produce a Tourism Master Plan for Sustainable Tourism Development in Vietnam. Through these initiatives the government of Vietnam has moved towards planning the management of tourism to ensure sustainable outcomes, and ecotourism and cultural tourism have been proposed as preferred tourism development options. One destination focus of this preferred tourism option is the protected area system of Vietnam. This article presents a series of themes as key areas for discussion, to assist Vietnam as it endeavors to assess the current proposed Tourism Master Plan (2001–2010) as a means of achieving national development objectives. A month-long ecotourism training workshop for protected area managers was held in Hanoi in February–March 2000. Through this workshop, four primary themes were identified as presenting major challenges for those with responsibility to balance conservation with increasing tourist visitation: the structure and administration of the protected area system, tourism infrastructure, providing for the needs of local communities, and effective communication across all relevant stakeholders. This article explores these challenges based on the review of a range of in-house reports and documents, the recorded views of Vietnamese government officials, academics, and protected area managers, discussions with and surveys of workshop participants, and visits to a number of national parks and tourist locations.

Green Nature or Green Fantasies: Representations of Ecotourism in Vietnam

“…The Vietnamese government recognizes it as a key industry that helps rural communities earn a living and raises public environmental awareness [47]. The proposed revision of the current Tourism Development Master Plan for Sustainable Tourism Development in Vietnam and the Ordinance on Tourism, which lays the legal and policy groundwork for developing tourism, with due regard for biodiversity conservation and social, cultural, and environmental sustainability, has been implemented by the Vietnamese government since early 1999 [48]. The IX National Congress of Vietnam approved a state decree on tourism for 2001-2010 in February 1999, recognizing tourism as a major economic driver and requiring the use of natural resources and cultural and historic sites to meet domestic and international tourism demand and regional tourism growth [44].…”

“…The cornerstone of the ecotourism system consists of the protected areas and scenic locations, both of which are vital to the preservation of natural resources and the environment [51]. Ecotourism in Vietnam's protected areas is a relatively new economic activity that could raise funds for forest rehabilitation and biodiversity conservation while providing local communities with a new source of income [48,52]. The Vietnam Forestry Development Strategy 2006-2020 encouraged public forest development planning, along with piloting and scaling up the licensing of special-use forests for ecotourism [53] (p. 25).…”

Visitor satisfaction with services for environmental interpretation in Cat Tien National Park, Vietnam

“…According to Lipscombe and Thwaites (2003), to face with the rapid development of the tourism industry, the Vietnamese government has elaborated many tourism policies since 1999 such as Ordinance on Tourism and the Tourism Master Plan for Sustainable Tourism Development in Vietnam.…”

“…Ecotourism and cultural tourism are the two top priorities whereas the protected area system of Vietnam is one of the important destinations (Lipscombe and Thwaites, 2003).…”