Vietnam officially opened its doors to international tourists from March 15. It seemed that this would be a new beginning for the entire tourism industry after more than 2 bleak years due to the impact of the epidemic, but the result was…waiting…continuous waiting…
Until March 14, the day before international guests were allowed to fly into Vietnam, tourism businesses still did not have a document detailing how to welcome guests and how to proceed with procedures. Every day, we receive hundreds of calls, thousands of emails asking about immigration procedures. But instead of answering specific questions and requests of guests, we can only respond in a general way; because even the minimum issues such as visa policy and immigration procedures do not have clear answers.
In fact, after an unsuccessful pilot period to welcome international guests, the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism has presented a plan to welcome international guests in a more open direction, such as suggesting that international visitors to Vietnam do not need to visit Vietnam. Register for a tour, but only need a certificate of full vaccination against Covid-19 or a certificate of recovery. A negative nCoV test result is required but rapid testing is allowed. However, this proposal was met with objections from the Ministry of Health. Just like that, the ministries and sectors could not agree with each other until the afternoon of March 14, the Government asked the Ministry of Health to immediately amend the regulations for tourists according to the open plan discussed previously. .
The delay in issuing the Government's guiding documents will make Vietnam's tourism miserable because it cannot retain old visitors, nor can it attract new visitors when the policies are still vague and unclear. This will cause extremely heavy losses for many Vietnamese businesses when they lose the delegations that they should have received if clearer regulations were introduced soon. Businesses don't want to wait, and they can't force tourists to wait…
Right now, businesses need to be transparent about information and need close and unified coordination between ministries and agencies, to start with the goal of welcoming 5 million international visitors in the year – a number that can be achieved. very modest compared to 2019, but challenging with the current slow opening.
