Chief of the Viet Nam Administration of Tourism (VAT) Vo Thi Thang has announced that the State will allocate 550 billion VND for developing the tourism infrastructure this year.

This funding will help call for more foreign and local investment into the area, Thang said, adding that VAT will disburse the money for four national key tourist zones and 17 theme tourist areas across the country to improve their tourism infrastructure facilities.

Alongside, the VAT will also use the funding to promote tourism in the Central and Central Highlands regions and to serve major events to be organised at big tourism centres.

Thang said her administration will coordinate with localities boasting national tourism sites to organise conferences calling for foreign investment in these sites. These localities will include the northern provinces of Quang Ninh and Ha Tay, Ha Noi, the central provinces of Thua Thien-Hue, Quang Nam, Khanh Hoa, and Da Nang city, and the southern province of Kien Giang.

The tourism sector plans to receive 3.2 million foreign visitors and to serve 15 million domestic tourists in 2005, representing year-on-year increases of 14 percent and 10.5 percent, respectively. It also aims to earn revenues of 30 trillion VND (1.9 billion USD), a 15 percent increase over 2004.

In 2004, the State pumped 500 billion VND into the tourism sector`s infrastructure facilities, 70 percent of which was channelled to national tourist sites and places of tourism potential with the aim to facilitate trans-national tours, and tours throughout Asia and on the East-West corridor.

Also last year, VAT attracted 110 million USD in foreign direct investment for projects to build infrastructure facilities, and 11.8 millin euros in official development assistance (ODA) for training human resources in the tourism sector.