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The signing ceremony took place in the central province of Thua Thien-Hue on April 4. 

Speaking at the event, General Director of Acecook Viet Nam Kajiwwara Junichi said the company is honour to support the event, adding that over the past 23 years, it has strived to maintain the value of traditional cuisine by combining Vietnamese flavour with Japanese technology. 

Themed “Cultural Heritage with Integration and Development: Hue - One Destination, Five World Heritages”, the biennial event aims to promote art exchanges among cultures and introducing unique values of the culture of Viet Nam and Hue, thus boosting service-tourism growth and strengthening socio-economic development of Thua Thien-Hue.

So far, the Hue Festival 2018 has attracted more than 20 international art troupes from various countries, including France, the Republic of Korea, Israel, Mongolia, Japan, Thailand, Russia, China and Spain.

The old capital city of Hue owns five UNESCO heritages, including Hue Complex of Monuments, Hue Royal Court Music, Woodblocks of Nguyen Dynasty (1802-1945), Nguyen Dynasty's royal documents and the royal literature on Hue royal architecture.

As Hue served as the imperial city under the Nguyen Dynasty (1802-1945), the festival will reenact royal celebrations and events such as Royal Night, Orient Legends and the Nam Giao ritual.

In addition, many side events will be held, such as the Hue Science Festival (organised by the Hue College of Medicine and Pharmacy), International Gastronomy Fair, beer carnival, International Trade Fair, Splendid Taste of Ancient Village in Phuoc Tich, traditional boat race on Huong (Perfume) River, kite festival, Tam Giang Lagoon Fantasy and Hue Poetry Festival.

Exhibitions taking different themes include ‘the poetry on Hue royal architectural works inscribed on truc chi (bamboo pulp) paper’, ‘colours of Bat Trang pottery’, ‘orchids and bonsai’, ‘old car exhibition’ and ‘cultural heritage with integration and development’.

Various sight-seeing tours offer more fantastic journeys to discover local attractions such as Lang Co beach and Tam Giang Lagoon.

Hue Festival has taken place every two years starting from 2000, bringing together excellent arts companies with unique performances from across the world.

This year, the province hopes to welcome about 4.2 million visitors, up 10 percent year on year, and earn tourism revenue of 4.2 billion VND, a rise of 15 percent.