Quang Nam (VNA) – The Smoke-freeCities ASEAN Network (SCAN) convened the 6th regional meeting in Hoi An city,the central province of Quang Nam, on November 20, focusing on reshapingtourism through smoke-free environments.

The event was attended by more than 100 foreigndelegates from smoke-free tourism cities of Thailand, Laos, Cambodia,Indonesia, Myanmar, Malaysia, the Philippines, China and Mongolia. It also saw thepresence of the Fund for Tobacco Harms Prevention and Control of the VietnameseMinistry of Health, the Southeast Asia Tobacco Control Alliance and the WorldHealth Organisation (WHO) Western Pacific Regional Office.

Addressing the meeting, Deputy Minister ofHealth Nguyen Viet Tien, member of the management council of the Fund forTobacco Harms Prevention and Control, said in Vietnam, the building ofsmoke-free tourism cities began in Hoi An city in 2009, and it has beenexpanded to some other cities like Ha Long, Hue, Nha Trang, and Hai Phong.

In these cities, smoking has been banned firstlyat restaurants, hotels, tourist sites, workplaces, schools and hospitals.Creating a smoke-free tourism environment has helped not only promote theirgreen and beautiful tourism images in foreign visitors’ eyes but also protectpeople’s health, he noted.

Tien added aside from famous tourist destinationcities, such efforts have also been made across Vietnam. Hundreds of thousandsof no-smoking signs and posters have been placed at attractions, workplaces,hospitals, and schools. This regulation is also shown on bulletin boards orentrance tickets at tourist sites. 

Activities to promote smoke-free cities havealso been carried out at cultural, sports and tourism events, including theAsian Beach Games in Da Nang city, the Do Temple Festival in Bac Ninh province,or the Vietnam – Japan cultural exchange in Hoi An.

According to the anti-smoking harms fund’sreport on the use of cigarettes among adults in Vietnam in 2016, efforts in thework have initially proved effective. The smoking rate dropped from 47.4percent to 45.3 percent among men and from 1.4 percent to 1.1 percent amongwomen.

The rate of exposure to secondhand smoke reducedconsiderably from 2010, from 84.9 percent to 80.7 percent at restaurants, from55.9 percent to 42.6 percent at workplaces, from 54.3 percent to 37.9 percentat universities and colleges, and from 34.4 percent to 19.4 percent on publictransport vehicles.

At the meeting, the Fund for Tobacco HarmsPrevention and Control pledged continued support for localities to createsmoke-free environments by enforcing the smoking ban at public places, steppingup communication activities to raise public awareness, and strengtheninginspections.

The 6th SCAN regional meeting aimed topopularise smoke-free tourist destinations, share experience in buildingsmoke-free tourism environments among ASEAN and Asia-Pacific countries, andenhance regional cooperation in the work.-VNA