Outbound market in India has grown at such phenomenal pace, that world’s every attractive destination wants to get a bigger market share. Vietnam is a highly attractive destination for tourists and famous for world heritages, idyllic beaches, tranquil bays, coral islands, spectacular mountains, valleys and primal forests, and is home to a warm-hearted and hospitable people. However, it has lagged behind in terms of building its presence in India’s big outbound tourist market, although the two countries have long historical cultural links and growing bilateral trade.
Catching up relatively late on this opportunity is the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, which now wants to capitalise on the direct connectivity between New Delhi and Ho Chi Minh City, which has been a long pending demand of travel trade from both countries.
According to Ton Sinh Thanh, Ambassador of Vietnam in India, “We are now expanding bilateral strategic partnership, thus creating favourable conditions for tourist exchanges. Over the last five years, the number of Indian tourists to Vietnam increased from 18,000 in 2011 to close to 100,000 in 2016. The number remains a very thin portion of the total number of Indian tourists travelling abroad and far behind the number of Indians going to other far-east destinations like Thailand, Singapore, and Malaysia.”
“The direct connectivity between the two countries will therefore act as a catalyst to increase the flow of Indian tourists to Vietnam. We expect that the growth momentum in inbound arrivals of Indians to Vietnam will double in a short duration of time with the new direct flight in place,” he added.
To add to the positive sentiment, Nguyen The Hang, First Secretary-Consular, Vietnamese Embassy assured that the Embassy in coordination with Vietnam National Administration of Tourism and Vietnamese tourist will extend all possible support to facilitate visa’s and continue with tourism promotion activities in India.
Moreover, Vietjet Air, a low cost private airline from Vietnam, announced the thrice-weekly direct flight from New Delhi to Ho Chi Minh city, scheduled to commence services from July 2017. Speaking to T3 at SATTE 2017, Nguyen Bac Toan, Vice Director– Commercial Department, Vietjet Air said, “Seeing the growth of arrivals from the India market, we have planned to launch direct flights to Ho Chi Minh city starting July this year. The flight, scheduled for thrice a week, will take five hours and 30 minutes to reach Vietnam. This will cut down the transit time by 50 per cent, as it takes about roughly 10 hours on stopover flights.”
The airline will operate Airbus A320 aircraft on this route, offering 180 seats. Initially the airline is looking to reach 80 per cent of load factor on both the routes with daily promotional schemes and is hopeful to see the numbers increasing in the future.
