Lesson 2: Promoting sustainable rural economy

Remove bottlenecks

Coming to the mountainous district of Khanh Son (Khanh Hoa) during the fruit harvest season, visitors can freely explore the beauty of fruit orchards full of fruit; enjoy famous delicious fruit specialties such as durian, rambutan, mangosteen, green-skinned grapefruit... This is also a land with many cultural features and traditional festivals of the Raglai people, so it has the power to attract tourists.

According to Chairman of the District People's Committee Dinh Van Dung, although Khanh Son has a lot of potential, the level of tourism development is still not commensurate with the potential. The limitations can be mentioned as: not many specific tourism products; lack of eco-tourism tours associated with mountains, forests, agriculture , rural areas and communities...

To promote tourism development associated with agriculture and rural areas, Khanh Son district has had orientations for rural tourism development such as: Building a community tourism development model in Hon Dung village (Son Hiep commune); maintaining and promoting traditional occupations and handicrafts such as weaving, making baskets, crossbows, making musical instruments to serve the shopping needs and souvenirs for tourists; preserving and promoting the cultural values ​​and typical traditions of the Raglai ethnic group associated with tourism development; building an agricultural eco-tourism site in Son Binh commune; linking gardeners to create conditions for tourists to visit fruit gardens.

Khanh Hoa has many historical and cultural relics, valuable architecture and many types of terrain, diverse and unique culture, rich products, converging factors to develop tourism associated with agriculture and rural areas. In addition, Khanh Hoa focuses on investing in and promoting key transport infrastructure projects, researching and developing tourism types associated with agriculture, traditional craft villages and ecological environment from the perspective of developing tourism associated with nature conservation and traditional and cultural values.

Despite great potential, the newly formed rural tourism models lack connection with professional travel agencies, so they have not brought high efficiency. Households doing tourism on the basis of agriculture are mainly spontaneous, small-scale, unprofessional, and have not formed attractive tourist destinations...

With the advantage of Quang Binh's landscape stretching from the sea to the mountains and the Truong Son range, with the Phong Nha-Ke Bang cave system... many localities in the area have formed homestay, farmstay and community tourism products. Among more than 40 areas, spots and tourism products chosen by many domestic and international tourists, many products are associated with rural areas, ethnic minority areas and mountainous areas, creating many basic, solid foundations and truly bringing sustainable economic development benefits to the people.

However, rural tourism in Quang Binh still has many limitations when tourism products are monotonous and lack professional skills. Infrastructure at many destinations has not been properly invested; tourism promotion and advertising have not been properly invested, and digital platforms have not been effectively applied to reach tourists.

Rural development drivers

According to the Standing Vice Chairman of the People's Committee of Quang Binh Province, Doan Ngoc Lam, for rural tourism and community tourism in Quang Binh to truly develop, the indispensable factor is local businesses and communities, therefore, cooperation and active participation of the community becomes the key to building a sustainable tourism industry.

Therefore, it is necessary to preserve and promote cultural and natural heritage, develop unique tourism products and experiences; strengthen cooperation between tourism businesses to exploit the tourist market; promote cooperation and linkage of local services, create richer and more diverse tourism programs to attract tourists.

Standing Vice Chairman of Khanh Hoa Provincial People's Committee Le Huu Hoang said that the province focuses on promoting grassroots development, promoting potentials and advantages in rural areas, craft villages, culture and ecological environment, contributing to shifting the rural economic structure towards multi-value integration, inclusiveness and sustainable development; focusing on building a tourism development strategy both in breadth and gradually shifting in depth, taking sea and island resort tourism products as the spearhead combined with complementary tourism such as entertainment, shopping, sightseeing and experiencing local culture.

The province is studying policies to support the development of community tourism, developing types of rural tourism associated with agriculture, traditional craft villages, and eco-tourism; linking tourism development with the conservation and promotion of natural resource values, cultural and artistic heritage values, and environmental protection; mobilizing, integrating, and effectively using resources for rural tourism development.

Quang Nam has also proposed solutions to promote investment in tourism development, especially rural tourism development. Accordingly, the province has carried out well the planning and investment in rural tourism destinations, ensuring that the landscape and environment are not damaged; attracting investors in large-scale, high-quality agricultural tourism products while ensuring that the community can participate in and benefit from these tourism products.

In addition, the province promotes propaganda, raises awareness, changes thinking, knowledge, and actions for officials, people, communities, and tourists on sustainable rural tourism development in new rural construction; strengthens coordination between levels and sectors in directing, supporting, and guiding the development of rural tourism products associated with increasing the value of agricultural products, villages, and craft villages in rural areas; focuses on training human resources directly involved in tourism along with tourism education in residential communities.

Director of the Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism of Quang Nam Nguyen Thanh Hong said that in the near future, Quang Nam will promote close links between parties in developing tourism products; promote the role of travel companies in connecting tourists to visit, stay and buy products. Take advantage of the support of international organizations to contribute to promoting the development of rural tourism.

Strengthening communication, promoting advertising; applying technology, promoting digital transformation in developing community tourism and rural agriculture. The current difficulty is the lack of mechanisms and policies to develop rural tourism in a synchronous manner; transport infrastructure, application of information technology to serve rural tourism is still limited and not synchronous; tourism services are small-scale, not meeting tourists' needs; industry linkages between tourism, agriculture and rural areas to form product value chains are still limited; the work of preserving and restoring traditional cultural values ​​in rural areas is still limited, the development of resources is not commensurate with the potential.

Therefore, in order for rural tourism to develop quickly and sustainably, the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism needs to soon issue a set of criteria for rural tourism destinations; at the same time, local authorities need to direct relevant agencies and units to advise on specific policies to encourage businesses to invest in agricultural and rural tourism.

Source: https://nhandan.vn/bai-2-thuc-day-kinh-te-nong-thon-ben-vung-post881735.html