A boat race at a Hung Kings Festival (Source: VNA)Phu Tho (VNA) – With natural and cultural advantages, the northern province of Phu Tho is considered a “golden” land for tourism development.
The locality is home to popular destinations such as the Hung Temple - a special national historical relic to worship the Hung Kings – the legendary founders of Vietnam; Au Co Mother Temple; and Tam Giang Pagoda.
Attractive tourist sites also include the fairy land Ao Gioi – Suoi Tien; Thanh Thuy hot spring resort; and Ao Chau Swamp - dubbed Ha Long in Phu Tho town with numerous islands and romantic landscape.
Furthermore, the province boasts world’s intangible cultural heritages of Hung Kings worshipping practice and “xoan” singing.
All have created a Phu Tho with huge potential to develop various forms of tourism such as eco-tourism, cultural tourism, and spiritual tourism.
To fully tap its strengths, the province has built a long-term tourism development strategy to turn the industry into a spearhead economy.
As planned, the tourism sector aims to draw nearly 5.8 trillion VND (261 million USD) in revenue by 2020.
It moves to increase investment for tourism by 13 trillion VND (585 million USD) in 2030 to improve infrastructure, human resources, and tourism products and services, especially in four tourism centres in Viet Tri city, and Thanh Thuy, Tan Son and Ha Hoa districts.
Authorities will apply particular policies to make it easier for businesses to invest in the field, while organising conferences and direct investment promotion programmes in the local key tourism centres, and increasing domestic and international connectivity.
This means to create a safe, hospitable, friendly and attractive destination for tourists with a target of welcoming 7.2 million domestic visitors and 7,500 foreigners by 2020, and earning over 3.8 trillion VND (171 million USD) in revenue.
The province is expected to welcome 25,000 overseas holidaymakers and 10.7 million at home by 2030.
According to the provincial Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism, Phu Tho greeted 7 million visitors each year in the 2011-2015 period, registering an annual growth of 4.3 percent.
In 2015 alone, the tourism sector raked in over 2.17 trillion VND (97.65 million USD) in revenue, three times against 2010, and generated jobs for 11,600 workers.-VNA
