Southeast Asia Information Port News (www.dnyxxg.com) Ho Chi Minh City's tourism industry is undergoing a critical transformation: while continuing to expand in scale, it is accelerating its transformation and upgrading towards "enhanced experience, regional connectivity, and radiating influence," gradually evolving from a simple tourist destination into a core hub integrating national tourism resources, guiding market trends, and connecting regional cultural and tourism networks. A new industry landscape is beginning to take shape. I. Continuously Enriched Tourism Products: Experiential Value Becomes the Core Competitive Advantage In early April 2026, the 22nd Ho Chi Minh City Tourism Festival, jointly organized by the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Tourism and the City Tourism Association, successfully concluded, delivering impressive results: sales of tourism routes, services, and products reached VND 120 billion during the event, featuring approximately 1,000 distinctive tourism products and cross-regional tourism routes, along with various promotional activities such as discounts, gifts, and lucky draws. This tourism festival innovatively integrated cultural tourism promotion with cultural entertainment and immersive interactive experiences, allowing tourists to experience high-quality products at competitive prices while also providing tourism businesses with an efficient market expansion platform.
Pham Huy Binh, Director of the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Tourism, stated that the festival not only achieved a breakthrough in scale but also successfully stimulated market demand, laying the foundation for subsequent cooperative projects and product upgrades, while also providing new inspiration for tourists' future travel.
In response to changing market demands, local tourism businesses are actively developing new products: the helicopter tour over Ho Chi Minh City (flying from Vung Tau, offering 15-60 minute options) has become a new benchmark for high-end experiences; the Cu Chi Tunnels launched a series of products during the April 30th Southern Liberation Day, National Reunification Day, and May 1st International Labor Day holidays, including the "War Zone Moonlight" nighttime tour, a mini zoo, shooting experiences, and Khmer cultural performances; in addition, themed routes such as "Binh Tay Market: Touching the Old Times," "New Dinh Imprints," "Saigon Welcomes the New Year," "Saigon Night Scene," and "Thuan Ho – Old Charm, New City," as well as 15 food tour routes covering the entire city, further enrich tourists' choices.
At the industry trend level, the focus on sustainable tourism continues to rise. Vu Ngoc Lam, Country Director of Agoda Vietnam, cited data from the 2026 Sustainable Tourism Survey, pointing out that more and more tourists are choosing tourism products that balance environmental protection and community benefits. This trend is particularly evident in the Asian market, confirming the growing importance of sustainable tourism in Vietnam. Nguyen Thi Anh Hoa, Chairwoman of the Saigontourist Group, also stated that the company is focusing on ecotourism and community experience tourism, conducting on-site investigations of local resources, focusing on assessing ecological endowments, experience potential, and infrastructure conditions to continuously improve product development capabilities. II. Addressing Cost Pressures and Optimizing Strategies to Stabilize the Market Since March 2026, the geopolitical conflicts in the Middle East have led to fluctuations in the global energy supply chain, causing a continuous rise in domestic oil prices in Vietnam, directly impacting the tourism industry, especially significantly increasing cost pressures for air and sea freight tourism products. To address this challenge, most airlines and transportation companies have not directly raised ticket prices, but instead absorbed costs by adjusting fuel surcharges, resulting in a more complex pricing structure for tourism products.
Against this backdrop, tourism enterprises in Ho Chi Minh City have proactively sought change, abandoning the extensive model of simply lowering prices and instead focusing on "optimizing product structure and enhancing experiential value" to strengthen their competitiveness. Specific measures include: first, increasing price transparency by listing fuel surcharges separately, allowing tourists to clearly understand the cost structure; second, optimizing booking and procurement strategies by securing airfare resources in advance to reduce the risks associated with cost fluctuations; and third, cultivating the short-distance and land-based tourism market by integrating diverse travel modes such as walking, cycling, and metro to develop high-value short-distance products.
For example, Vietravel, despite rising global operating costs, has maintained stable ground service prices, separately accounting for air and transportation costs and flexibly adjusting them according to market changes. This approach ensures service quality while effectively protecting customer rights. Vietravel CEO Tran Tuan The Vi emphasized that the company will reasonably adjust related fees but will never lower service standards, always focusing on "safety, integrity, and high value" to provide tourists with a high-quality travel experience and solidify market trust. III. Strengthening Supervision and Safeguarding the Healthy Development of the Industry
To create a safe, healthy, and standardized tourism environment, Ho Chi Minh City has continuously strengthened its supervision and inspection of tourism operators, strictly implementing the transparent pricing system. The City Tourism Department closely monitors fluctuations in oil prices and changes in tourism service prices, focusing on preventing unreasonable price increases and forced consumption that may occur during the April 30th and May 1st holidays, and making every effort to protect the legitimate rights and interests of tourists.
In the future, Ho Chi Minh City's tourism industry will continue to focus on "enhancing the value of the experience" as its core competitiveness, attracting and retaining tourists through a differentiated product portfolio, promoting the industry's transformation from scale expansion to quality and efficiency, and achieving long-term sustainable development. (End)
