Potential

The city has also received various honourable titles such as Asia’s Leading City Break Destination 2022 and World’s Leading City Destination 2022 at the World Travel Awards 2022, and the World's Best Golf City Destination 2023.

Ha Noi now has six clusters of golf courses with 10 standard courses such as Long Bien, Van Tri Golf Club, Kings Island Golf, Minh Tri and Legend Hill, and some 10 practicing golf courses, such as Dao Sen, Phuong Dong and Ha Noi Club.

A corner of Long Bien golf course (Photo: hanoimoi.vn)

These are large, professional golf courses meeting international standards with diverse natural landscapes, meeting the demands of players.

In addition, Ha Noi has 4 and 5–star hotels such as JW Marriot, Sheraton and Metropole with convenient access to golf courses.

Visitors to Ha Noi can easily access neighboring golf courses like the ones in Vinh Phuc, Hoa Binh, Hai Duong, Hai Phong and Quang Ninh provinces.

Ha Noi intends to make golf a key tourism product, closely linked with MICE services and wellness tourism, among others, to attract foreign travelers during the off-peak season.

The markets targeted for golf tourism in the short term are Korea, Japan, Taiwan (China) and Southeast Asian countries, while potential markets include Australia, the Middle East and North America.

In addition, Ha Noi is making a plan to form cultural, experiential and ecological tourism routes in Son Tay to complement golf tourism activities.

Challenges

Although Ha Noi has a lot of potential, it still face challenges to develop golf tourism. According to experts, Ha Noi has a long way to catch up with other countries in Asia in terms of the number of golf courses.

The fee for playing golf is much higher than that in other countries and the average income of locals, which has led to a limited number of Vietnamese people playing golf.

The number of international guests to Ha Noi to play golf remains low. The connection between travel agencies and golf courses is still weak and golf tourism has not linked with other tourism forms.

Golf courses themselves have not linked with one another and have not promoted golf tourism professionally.

At present, most travel agencies have not paid much attention to golf tourism. The human resources in tourism have not been trained in golf properly. The golf tourism product remains poor and simple. Golf tourism has not been promoted widely and has not used much technology.

Pham Thanh Tri, permanent deputy president of the Vietnam Tourism Golf Association (VTGA), said that golf courses should apply more technology to exchange information between clubs.

The VTGA has introduced Southeast Asia Tourism Golf on its website since June this year, through which customers can book golf tours to Southeast Asian countries including Vietnam.

The association will also introduce an app to connect golf courses, training facilities, 3D golf practicing rooms, hotels, airlines and tourist destinations.

In 2023, Ha Noi's tourism industry made an impressive recovery with many remarkable achievements. Through the successfully organized cultural events, namely Ao Dai Tourism Festival, Ha Noi Gift Tourism Festival, and Ha Noi Creative Design Festival, among others, the inbound tourism growth has increased significantly.

The number of tourists to Ha Noi reached 22.6 million in the January-November period, an increase of 32.4% year-on-year. Among these arrivals, international tourists are estimated at 4.1 million, a threefold increase compared with the same period in 2022, exceeding the annual target. Meanwhile, the number of domestic tourists hit around 18.7 million, up 17.5%./.

BTA