La Quoc Khanh, Deputy Director of the Culture, Sport and Tourism Department, said that in order to develop shopping tourism, it is necessary to develop good shopping points which offer cheap and high quality commodities. Meanwhile, the city has not given the appropriate attention to developing the shopping point network.

There are only two well-known points for foreign tourist shops in HCM City, ‘Miss Ao Dai’ and ‘Miss Sai Gon.’ Fine arts and handicraft article shops in the city have been developing spontaneously, therefore, travel firms and travelers do not know where they should visit. Meanwhile, other shopping centres like Diamond Plaza or Parkson, seem to have a small scale.

“Regional countries all have big trade centres like Berjaya Times Square in Malaysia, SM Mall of Asia, and the SM Megamall in the Philippines, therefore, their shopping tourism has been developing very well,” Khanh said.

The Head of the Marketing Division of a travel firm in HCM City also said that the sale programs prove to be unattractive to foreign travelers. He said that Singapore, Thailand or Malaysia always offer big sale programs which offer price discounts for a lot of types of commodities to travelers. Meanwhile, in Vietnam, a big sale program means the sale of out-of-date or error products.

Most of foreign travelers to Vietnam do not know what to purchase. “I have just met a Malaysian traveler. He told me he had US $1,000, and he returned to Malaysia with US $800, while the US $200 was spent on small purchases and a massage,” Khanh said.

In fact, the HCM City authorities have well realized the problem, and are organizing competitions on designing souvenirs. However, the designs which got the prizes at the competitions could not serve tourism due to the low commercial level.

Changes needed

The tour guides that local newspapers’ reporters contacted related that they were always very enjoyable when serving the travelers to Thailand, Singapore or Malaysia. It is because the shopping points in the countries all have been classified, and they can be sure that travelers can be led to prestigious shopping points. Meanwhile, there has not been clear information given about the shopping points in Vietnam, which has been putting difficulties for both travel firms and travelers.

Khanh said that HCM City still cannot define which points are the most outstanding features of the city.

Khanh added that the city’s culture department is trying to fill the hole of the city’s tourism; however, many things prove to be out of reach of the department. Is it feasible to build a big shopping centre in the suburb of the city? Is it advisable to set up supermarts and souvenir shops in the Phu My Hung urban area?

A lot of questions and a lot of ideas have been mentioned. However, according to Khanh, it is not easy to turn the ideas into reality. “You think that it is necessary to set up a tourism centre in the area, but maybe investors think that it would be better to build tennis courses or swimming pools here instead,” Khanh said.

T