Tourism - poverty reduction aid

Step by step synchronization of tourism policies

Tourism is one of the sectors identified by Yen Bai as a key economic sector, suitable for highland areas and ethnic minority areas with the goal and expectation of effective and sustainable poverty reduction. Therefore, for many years, Yen Bai has issued many policies to support and promote tourism development. On April 19, 2021, the Provincial People's Council issued

Resolution No. 10 stipulates a number of policies to support tourism development in the province for the period 2021 - 2025. After more than 3 years of implementation, the province has approved support for 270 dossiers of organizations and individuals requesting to benefit from policies with a total budget of over 5.73 billion VND, including: establishing 231 new dossiers, maintaining art troupes in the province; supporting the establishment of classes to teach intangible culture; supporting the maintenance of craft villages to develop tourism; supporting waste collection teams and tourism human resource training classes...

The policies have contributed to supporting collectives, individuals, villages and hamlets to develop tourism activities, improve the quality of tourism services, especially community tourism, and link the preservation and promotion of unique cultural values of ethnic groups with tourism development. However, only 6/11 policies have been implemented due to many reasons, including the reason of beneficiary conditions that make it difficult for the subjects to access. Therefore, in the period of 2024-2030, the Provincial People's Council continues to issue Resolution No. 81, effective from October 10, 2024.

The Resolution has 12 policies, including many new policies such as: rewarding 1 billion VND for villages/hamlets recognized by the province as meeting the criteria of community tourism villages/hamlets; supporting the preparation of project dossiers to build community tourism villages (hamlets) for localities with villages (hamlets) approved by the Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee to implement the construction of community tourism villages (hamlets) with a cost of no more than 400 million VND/1 dossier; supporting the cost of preparing dossiers to request recognition of community tourism villages/hamlets; borrowing capital to invest in tourism development by the Yen Bai Provincial Social Policy Bank Branch, lending no more than 500 million VND/1 household...

There are also some old policies from Resolution No. 10 but the support amount has been increased and the conditions for benefits have been adjusted to make them more accessible to people.

From Resolution No. 10 to Resolution No. 81, the tourism policy system is quite comprehensive and synchronous in order to develop tourism, from tourism infrastructure, human resource training to investment promotion and advertising; especially supporting the exploitation of the strengths of natural landscapes combined with the cultural identities of ethnic groups to form unique tourism products.

Tourism - poverty reduction aid

Along with perfecting the policy system, the province has also focused on building the Yen Bai tourism brand, aiming to perfect the green tourism ecosystem according to the value chain. The province supports and encourages organizations and individuals to invest and develop the province's strong tourism products in key tourism areas such as: community tourism products associated with learning about indigenous ethnic cultures; building and developing eco-tourism products; developing spiritual tourism products; building and developing adventure tourism products; organizing many tourism promotion activities... At the same time, opening more attractive tours, contributing significantly to creating strong links so that Yen Bai is always an attractive destination for domestic and foreign tourists.

It must be affirmed that as tourism develops and attracts more and more tourists to the area, the lives of ethnic minority people will improve, with more jobs and income. This can be seen most clearly in the two poor districts of Mu Cang Chai and Tram Tau, where tourism is becoming a key economic sector in the locality, helping to significantly reduce the poverty rate in these localities.

In 2024 alone, Tram Tau reduced 418 poor households and 72 near-poor households; Mu Cang Chai reduced 1,298 poor households and 345 near-poor households. With a population of over 90% Mong ethnic people, limited education and awareness, a lack of confidence and a closed lifestyle, tourism is gradually contributing to changing them. Taking advantage of support policies, they boldly borrowed capital to renovate and repair their houses to make homestays and do community tourism.

They learn English to communicate with foreign visitors and actively participate in tourism training courses organized by the locality. They encourage each other to do a good job of raising cattle, pigs, chickens, cleaning the house, planting flowers from the gate to each house for tourism. The house grounds are planted with many flowers, green trees, and beautiful miniature landscapes to serve the check-in needs of visitors.

Local cuisine is focused on, carefully prepared, delicious and beautiful. Experiential tours are organized regularly, serving well the needs of cultural exploration, entertainment, arts... Thanks to that, in 2024 alone, these two poor districts welcomed over 520,000 tourists, bringing in revenue of over 500 billion VND.

Tourism has actually created income and direct jobs for accommodation establishments and many local workers participating in the tourism ecosystem such as: businesses, retail goods, motorbike taxis, porters, local tour guides and farmers producing and processing local agricultural products... Many Mong people here have shared that since the large number of tourists have come to the locality, agricultural products from vegetables, wild fruits to chickens, pigs, bottles of honey... are consumed more easily than ever.

Mong ethnic brocade products are better consumed thanks to tourism.

The benefits that tourism brings to people in highland and ethnic minority areas have confirmed that tourism is becoming an effective poverty reduction aid for these areas. In 2024 alone, the number of poor ethnic minority households decreased by 6,433 people compared to 2023, with 11,283 poor ethnic minority households, accounting for 89.7% of poor households in the province. Therefore, tourism is expected to continue to support ethnic minority people in poverty reduction.

However, in order for tourism to truly become a sustainable poverty reduction tool, local authorities need to continue to develop policy mechanisms to attract resources to invest in tourism infrastructure in the direction of ensuring environmental sanitation, security and order to attract tourists from all over the world; strengthen the construction of tourism images to international friends by promoting civilized lifestyles, organizing information, guiding and supporting tourists at tourist destinations, especially building a movement of civilized behavior, having an open, sincere and enthusiastic attitude towards tourists; diversify tourism products, increase investment in tourism infrastructure to fully exploit available potential.

At the same time, there are effective solutions to restore and promote the unique cultural activities of the people, creating a unique mark to serve tourists. Only then will people not be left out and enjoy the benefits that the tourism industry brings.

In 2024, Yen Bai will welcome and serve over 2.1 million visitors, an increase of 3%, of which international visitors are estimated at 270,000; revenue is estimated at VND 1,790 billion, equal to 119.3% of the plan, up 4% over the same period. In the first quarter of 2025, Yen Bai is also estimated to welcome 742,335 visitors, an increase of 7.1% over the same period last year; international visitors reached 83,582, an increase of 0.7% over the same period in 2024; revenue is estimated at over VND 632.2 billion, an increase of 16.9% over the same period last year.

Hoai Anh

Source: https://baoyenbai.com.vn/12/349372/Du-lich---tro-luc-giam-ngheo.aspx