The 49th Meeting of the ASEAN National Tourism Organisations opens
Update: Jan 15, 2019
(TITC) – From 14-15 January 2019, the 49th Meeting of ASEAN National Tourism Organisations (NTOs) opened in Ha Long City, Viet Nam, under the chairmanship of Viet Nam and Brunei.

The meeting had the attendance of about 100 delegates including leaders and officials of ASEAN NTOs, ASEAN Secretariats, international organizations...

Delivering opening speech, Chairman of Viet Nam National Administration of Tourism (VNAT), Mr. Nguyen Trung Khanh highly valued ASEAN tourism cooperation. In 2018, ASEAN countries implemented a wide range of cooperation activities. This was the time to raise issues for discussions and agreements among member states. He said the meeting of ASEAN NTOs was an important occasion to review the work done and call for recommendations from all member states to efficiently foster the regional collaboration, as well as share the updates, experiences and new practices on tourism.

VNAT's Chairman Nguyen Trung Khanh

ASEAN tourism industry has been developing significantly in recent years with the effective cooperation among ASEAN member states and partners, contributing to the prosperous, sustainable and inclusive development of ASEAN destinations, with respects to individual benefits of each country’s tourism industry.

On behalf of the host country of the ASEAN Tourism Forum (ATF) 2019, Chairman Nguyen Trung Khanh hoped that all member states would constantly keep this spirit to jointly promote ASEAN as a single destination, contributing to the success of the ATF Viet Nam 2019 with the theme “ASEAN-The Power of One”.

At the meeting, the delegates considered and adopted the reports of ASEAN Tourism committees related to issues as tourism marketing; tourism products; tourism investments; tourism standards; connectivity, destination infrastructure and travel facilitation; gastronomy tourism; community and private sector participation; tourism safety and security, heritage protection and management of sites; Environment and climate change, etc.

Thanh Tam