Themed ‘Attracting Vietnamese visitors to Saint Petersburg’, the two-day forum will focus on enhancing tourism cooperation between the two sides.
The delegates will also discuss measures to promote potential and create a favourable environment to attract more Russian visitors to Vietnam and Vietnamese tourists to the ‘Northern capital’ of Russia.
Speaking at the forum, Vo Duy Sang, head of the delegation from the north central province of Thanh Hoa, emphasised that the forum offers a good opportunity for the locality to access information to set orientations in developing high-quality tourism products for visitors from Thanh Hoa to Saint Petersburg.
According to Gorokhov Aleksander Felisovich, General Director of the Union of National and International Tourism Information Organisations (SONATO), the promotion of potentials for tourism cooperation between Vietnam and Saint Petersburg has faced numerous obstacles due to the lack of direct air routes between Saint Petersburg and major cities in Vietnam. In addition, Vietnam has not been included in the list of countries participating in the electronic visa programme.
Kalganov Vyacheslav, head of Saint Petersburg's external relations committee, affirmed that he will propose the simplification of visa-related procedures to the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
He also emphasised the traditional relations between Vietnam and Russia, creating favourable conditions for two sides to strengthen tourism cooperation and people-to-people exchange.
On the occasion, Sam Son City (Thanh Hoa Province) signed a cooperation agreement on tourism with a central district of Saint Petersburg.
