The Vietnam National Administration of Tourism (VNAT) has unveiled aplan to promote the tourism industry overseas with a target to welcome 8million foreign visitors this year.

Under the plan, theauthority and travel businesses will participate in internationaltourism exhibitions and promotion programmes in Japan, the Republic ofKorea (RoK), China, Russia, Europe and Southeast Asia.

It willfocus on popular tourism fairs that attract a large number ofparticipants such as the international tourism expo in Russia's Moscow,the Top Resa fair in France, the CITM fair in China and the ITB Berlinfair in Germany.

It will also organise trips to Vietnam forforeign reporters to promote the country's tourism potential as well astighten the relationship between local and foreign travel firms.

This year, VNAT will try to expand its markets through attending tourism expos in the Middle East and India.
In addition, the tourism industry will promote golf tourism, whichtargets the RoK market, a potential market for this tourism segment.

Although the golf tourism is still new and has yet to be developed inVietnam, there are more and more tourists from the RoK who are coming toHo Chi Minh City to play golf, especially at weekends.

Under the plan, VNAT will also organise food festivals to further promote tourism activities.

The country's tourism will continue to be promoted on social networks, smart phones and the internet, according to VNAT.

Vietnam received more than 7.5 million foreign tourists last year, a rise of 10.6 percent over the previous year.

Last year, the industry spent some 20 billion VND (1 million USD) on the promotion programmes.VNA