Nguyen Manh Cuong, Deputy Director General of the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism (VNAT), made the statement at a conference in Hanoi on March 8 to honour collectives and individuals for their outstanding achievements in the event.

He said ATF 2009 was a good forum for domestic travel companies to increase business capacity and seek opportunities for cooperation with foreign counterparts.

Vietnam hosted the largest regional tourist event for the first time from January 5-12, 2009. Despite the global economic and financial woes, the forum attracted a record high number of 2,064 delegates, comprising ministers, senior officials, businesses and media workers from ASEAN countries.

During the event, Vietnam had many bilateral meetings with foreign delegations to boost cooperation and garner support for its tourism development. The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism (MCST) launched a discount programme “Impressive Vietnam” at ATF 2009 to deal with falling numbers of foreign arrivals. The programme, which ended last December, brought fairly practical results.

Acknowledging the success of the forum, the Prime Minister has awarded the certificate of merit to two collectives and five individuals in the MCST; MCST has presented the certificate of merit to 43 collectives and 71 individuals; and VNAT conferred awards on 23 collectives and 91 individuals.

In the past two months, Vietnam received more than 877,000 foreign visitors, an increase of 27.4% from a year earlier.