Assess the impact of the covid 19 pandemic on Vietnam tourism and suggest some possible solutions to the case study

Vietnam tourism industry is considered one of the key economic sectors with many potentialities, diversity, and abundance. 2019 is a successful year for Vietnam's tourism, not only shown in the statistics on the number of international tourists, domestic tourists, revenue, but also the titles that Vietnam tourism achieved. However, the Covid-19 epidemic had a relatively large impact on the Vietnamese economy, of which the tourism industry was heavily affected.
The World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) expressed the Covid 19 translation has had a serious impact on the tourism business globally. Vietnam tourism has been also significantly affected by the Covid-19 epidemic. According to the General Statistics Office, international visitors to Vietnam as of September 2020 only reached 3.78 million visitors. The majority of international visitors to Vietnam in 9 months gathered in the first quarter when the epidemic had not yet broken out, accounting for 97% of the total of 3.68 million visitors. Meanwhile, the third quarter recorded just over 51,000 visitors, lower than the number of 57,000 visitors in the second quarter. In particular, the two largest international tourist markets of Vietnam, China, and Korea, both decreased by 91.5% and 91.4%.
As of August 2020, travel tourism revenue was estimated at 13.1 trillion VND, which decreased 54.4% over the same period due to the Covid-19, which made domestic tourism stimulus policies couldn’t continue. Many tourists canceled the tour. Besides many cultural festival events was canceled, some attractions must be closed. The decline in visitors under the impact of the epidemic affected tourism service revenues in the first quarter of 2020. According to the General Statistics Office, revenue from accommodation and catering services in the period was estimated at 126,200 billion VND, equivalent to 10% of the total revenue from commercial activities and services of the country, a decrease of 9.6% compared to the first quarter. All tours from Vietnam to foreign countries were also canceled because the COVID-19, caused billions of losses for travel agencies and the aviation industry. Millions of labors in the tourism industry have their incomes reduced, even get fired due to lacking of jobs.
In the post-Covid-19 era, the Vietnamese economy in general and the tourism industry, in particular, need timely solutions to overcome difficulties, and promote Vietnam's tourism advantages. First of all, it is necessary to focus on promoting domestic tourism. Businesses need to offer synchronous solutions from launching domestic tourism demand to linking service providers such as airlines, transportation, hotels and restaurants to form diverse package tours with preferential prices for domestic tourists. New domestic tourism routes will be shorter, focusing on exploiting community ecotourism, towards cultural and natural heritages, ensuring safety for tourists. In addition to the domestic tourism stimulus programs, the measures to ensure the prevention of epidemics should be thoroughly and seriously implemented by localities, travel businesses, hotels, airlines ...
Furthermore, we can develop a new trend of tourism to attract foreign tourists. Virtual reality(VR) is considered as a part of smart tourism to provide information about destinations and attractions while showing its potential to become a new tourism service. By using interactive, realistic, detailed VR navigations, tourists have a change to experience a destination in advance as well as set the activity planning. This trend has proven to be very useful, however, Vietnam is still facing difficulties in keeping up with this smart technology. VR technologies will surely continue to advance, and as such, the opportunities in the tourism sector will grow exponentially

Finally, the State should promulgate tax exemption and reduction policies for companies in the tourism industry such as the VAT exemption for tourism consumption and tourism businesses. Environmental costs for travel agency, flat tax reduction for individual tourism business households should be reducted. In stead a service charge, the electricity prices can apply according to the unit price of electricity produced for restaurants, tourist accommodation services.
Currently, Vietnam has many advantages as a country that successfully controlled the earliest Covid-19 epidemic, which is highly appreciated by countries around the world. This is an advantage that needs to take advantage of media effects to enhance the image of Vietnamese tourism in a safety and attractively way.