The number of foreign visitors travelling to Vietnam in the first month of 2019 is estimated to reach over 1.5 million

Accordingly, arrivals by air and sea increased by 1.4% and 26.9% compared to the same period last year, respectively, while those arriving by land decreased 30.5%.

The number of Asian tourists hit over 1.1 million during January, up 5.4% over the same period last year. Visitors from the Republic of Korea (RoK) went up 23%, surpassing China to become the country with highest number of travellers to Vietnam.

The number of European visitors rose by 3.1% year-on-year, including those from Russia (up 2.2%), the UK (3.9%), France (1.3%), Germany (3.9%), Sweden (6%) and Italy (3.9%).

In addition, tourists from America and Oceania were up 7.8% and 0.2%, respectively, while the number of African visitors was down 2.1% over January last year.

The tourism sector expected to serve 6.6 million domestic tourists this month and earn VND56.5 trillion from both domestic and international visitors, a year-on-year increase of 6.6%.

Vietnam also targeted to receive 18 million foreign visitors and serve 85 million domestic tourists in 2019, earning total revenue of over VND700 trillion.