This was the first year the city's tourism has seen a decline in international arrivals since the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) outbreak in 2003.

La Quoc Khanh, deputy director of the city department of Culture, Sports and Tourism, told the Daily yesterday that signs of a slowdown surfaced in the middle of 2008 an again in recent months.

"Guests are increasing a bit but we think that the city's tourism still has a hard time. We've tried our best for activities to woo tourists back but we couldn't because this is the common situation of the travel industry;' Khanh said.

The Pacific Asia Travel Association on December 9 reported that Asia Pacific destinations were facing a 5 percent drop in international arrivals in 2009. This means the region will receive 17 million fewer visitors this year than in 2008 when there were 377 million arrivals.

HCM City is the biggest tourism centre of the country. Normally foreign visitors to the city account for more than half of the total number of foreign visitors to Vietnam.

According to Khanh, based on feedback from overseas partners, hoteliers and tour operators and the city's tourism department have estimated that the number of foreign visitors in 20 10 would reach 2.8 million, the same as in 2008.

We once thought about 2.7 million but tourism entrepreneurs have reported optimistic bookings for next year. The better signal has made us increase the goal to 2.8 million' Khanh said.

The city last year expected to welcome around.3.1 million-international tourists in 2009.

Some hoteliers in downtown HCM City said the tourism sector had not recovered based on bookings for the first months of 2010.

Dang Huy Hai, deputy general director of the five-star New World Saigon Hotel, said that bookings for I March were quite good while January and February were not.

"We've 55 percent bookings for next March and estimate to sell 75 percent for the month. But we think that up to the 'middle of 2010, tourism will not be recovered because bookings for other months are still low:' Hai said.

Khanh said his department was planning activities to promote tourism in 2010. "We expect the budget for next year will be the same with this year's budget of around nine billion dong".

The department is planning a ceremony to welcome the first international visitors to the city on the first day of 2010. As usual, the ceremony will take place at Tan. Son Nhat International Airport.

The HCM City Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism yesterday called a meeting with hotels in HCM City to deliver a request from the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism asking hotels keep promotion rates so tour, operators can make attractive package tours to woo foreign visitors.

However, such hotels said they did not change promotion rates for 2009. The change is for 2010 only.

The Saigon Times Daily - December 22, 2009