At the meeting, Deputy Director General of VNAT Nguyen Manh Cuong emphasized, in recent years, the relationship and cooperation between Viet Nam and Hong Kong has been strengthened. Viet Nam hopes to exchange tourism development experiences with Hong Kong and expects the visit to be an opportunity for tourism cooperation between the two sides.

Executive Director of HKTB Anthony Lau introduced Hong Kong tourism’s development situation. In 2013, Hong Kong welcomed nearly 54 million tourist arrivals, of which 70% from Mainland China. Besides, Hong Kong has set the target of attracting tourists from other markets, especially from Viet Nam.

In recent years, Hong Kong has focused on cruise tourism development. Thanks to its strategic location, Hong Kong is considered a cruise tourism center with 2 big tourism seaports. Mr Anthony Lau proposed Viet Nam to join in the Strategic Cruise Union including Taiwan, Hong Kong, Japan and Viet Nam to connect seaports of these 4 destinations and promote cruise tourism development. Hong Kong has also launched “Asian Cruise Fun” program aiming to support travel agencies in cruise tourism.

Deputy Director General of VNAT Nguyen Manh Cuong highly valued the initiative of HKTB. To strengthen cooperation between the two sides, VNAT will support HKTB to work with management boards of seaports in Viet Nam and support Hong Kong’s Famtrips to survey Viet Nam’s destinations and seaports.

On this occasion, Mr Anthony Lau also extended an invitation to VNAT to join the “Pacific Cruise Tourism Conference” in November 2014. This will be an opportunity for exchange of cruise tourism development experiences among the countries in the Pacific region.