International tourists coming to Vietnam from Asia have been a large component of the sector in recent years, but even these key markets, such as China, Japan, Singapore, Malaysia, South Korea and Taiwan (China) have dropped off, with numbers falling between ten to 70 %.

The last two months, which has seen the A/H1N1 flu virus arrive in Vietnam, has been particularly bad, causing Asian visitor numbers to drop even more sharply.

The number of Japanese visitors using Vietnamese travel agencies has decreased by 70 % compared with the same period last year.

Many tourism agencies specializing in Japanese visitors have had to cancel tours, which were booked two or three months ago due to the spread of A/H1N1 virus.

The effect has been made worse as tourism agencies do not know how many Japanese visitors will come to Vietnam in July, as they generally book tours to two to three months in advance.

B.T. My, a tour guide for Japanese visitors, usually leads tours everyday but is currently only taking a tour once a fortnight. With the short fall in numbers, she is now giving tours in Japan for Vietnamese. 

Occupancy also has fallen significantly at high end and large hotels in Ho Chi Minh City, some are running at around 50 % or lower.

At the current time, high end hotel’s room rates decreased by 30-40% compare with last year.

With the situation, Vietnam’s tourism industry is finding it difficult to achieve the target of 4.5 million foreign visitors this year. They may welcome more than 3.2 million visitors instead, a decrease of around 20 % compared with last year.