Published:  23:31 Sunday - March 03, 2013

The number of foreign tourists visiting Vietnam in February 2013 posted more than 570,000, a reduction of 11.2% from the previous month, according to figures by the General Statistics Office (GSO).

Of these, more than 462,000 foreign tourists travelled to Vietnam by air, making up more than 81% of the total number of foreigners to the country, while those arriving by sea and road were 20,000 (3.5%) and 88,000 (15.43%), respectively.

The total number of foreigners to Vietnam in the first two months this year is estimated at more than 1.2 million, a year-on-year decrease of 9.6%.

China continued to lead the market of foreigners visiting Vietnam, with more than 333,000, followed by the RoK (more than 156,000), Japan (98,600) and the US (more than 90,000).

Meanwhile, the domestic tourism market was very busy during the January-February period thanks to the New Year’s Eve, Christmas and Lunar New Year (Tet) holidays. Since the start of the year, about 7.8 million domestic tourists travelled nationwide, a year-on-year rise of 11.3%. Total tourism revenue reached 35 trillion VND, a year-on-year increase of 7.9%.

* According to statistics from Hanoi’s department of culture, sport and tourism, during the lunar New Year (Tet) holiday 2013, the capital city of Hanoi greeted more than 2 million tourists, up 11% from the same period last year; of which 60,000 were foreign tourists,

DLO