Tapping into heritage economy to develop tourism in ancient imperial capital

According to Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism Lam Thi Phuong Thanh, Hue is a city rich in identity and international influence, with the title of “Festival City” widely recognised by international friends. Hue City needs to continue renewing its thinking, creating development momentum, and identifying culture and tourism as its main driving forces.

In the coming time, the locality should continue promoting its strengths in building and developing the cultural values and people of Hue. At the same time, it should study the development of a heritage city associated with cultural preservation and development, together with people’s livelihoods, ensuring harmony with modern development trends. Above all, heritage should be transformed into economic value to serve development.

Accordingly, Hue City needs to continue focusing on developing tourism into a spearhead economic sector with tourism models such as resort tourism, heritage tourism, night tourism, and culinary tourism. Through this, the city aims to create distinctive tourism products that provide authentic experiences for visitors.

In addition, Hue needs to strengthen tourism links with neighbouring localities, spread its distinctive cultural values, improve service quality, and enhance the competitiveness of the destination.

Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism Lam Thi Phuong Thanh noted that Hue receives a large number of international visitors. Therefore, the city needs to improve its capacity for international cooperation, intensify tourism promotion, and organise regional and international-scale events. At the same time, it should continue closely coordinating with the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism in implementing local development programmes and tasks.

Assessing the strengths of the former imperial land, Head of the Viet Nam National Authority of Tourism Nguyen Trung Khanh said: “Hue possesses abundant heritage resources and is striving to boost promotion and publicity while innovating tourism products to attract visitors. The city has developed a Project on Tourism and Tourism Services Development for Hue City for the 2025–2030 period, with a vision to 2045, with clear orientations.”

In 2025, Hue successfully hosted the National Tourism Year and recorded outstanding results in tourism activities, welcoming 6.3 million visitors, an increase of 61% compared to the same period in 2024. This demonstrates that Hue is moving in the right direction in positioning and development, gradually becoming one of the country’s important tourism centres.

In addition, the Lang Co–Canh Duong Tourism Area has been included in the planning to become a national tourism zone. In terms of facilities and tourism infrastructure, the entire city currently has nearly 900 tourist accommodation establishments, meeting the growing demand of visitors.

Building Hue into national green city

Chairman of the Hue City People’s Committee Nguyen Khac Toan shared that Hue is considered a land rich in memories and values, which is striving to transform itself in a more innovative, modern, and dynamic direction while still being based on its distinctive cultural heritage foundation.

Accordingly, the city is focusing on restoring and preserving heritage sites so that they become living heritage. This contributes to attracting an increasing number of visitors to Hue. The locality is also building a long-term strategic vision and has basically completed preservation and heritage planning work.

Despite facing many difficulties and challenges, Hue’s economy still achieved growth of 8.5% in 2025. In particular, tourism developed strongly as never before, with around 6.3 million visitors.

“During the recent April 30–May 1 holiday, the total number of tourists visiting Hue City over five days (from April 29 to May 3) was estimated at 610,000, up 73.7% compared to the same period last year,” Chairman of the Hue City People’s Committee Nguyen Khac Toan said.

Looking ahead, Hue aims to become a distinctive heritage city of Viet Nam by 2030 and a unique cultural centre of Asia by 2045. The city also strives to make cultural industries a spearhead economic sector, contributing more than 20% of the city’s GRDP.

To achieve this goal, the locality needs close coordination with ministries and sectors, along with research into support policies for preserving and developing distinctive traditional cultural values.

Looking back over recent years, the Viet Nam National Authority of Tourism has closely coordinated with the Hue Department of Tourism and relevant units to effectively organise promotion and publicity activities. Hue is one of the pioneering localities in developing sustainable tourism nationwide. The destination has also been honoured three times with the title “ASEAN Clean Tourist City” and is the only city in Viet Nam recognised as a “National Green City.”

Highly appreciating the pilot idea of developing Hue into a national green city, Head of the Viet Nam National Authority of Tourism Nguyen Trung Khanh affirmed that the authority would continue accompanying Hue in implementing development goals and creating conditions for the locality to host major domestic and international events.

“In 2025, the Viet Nam National Authority of Tourism brought the image of Hue to tourism promotion roadshows and international tourism fairs, generating very positive impressions among international friends. In the coming time, communication activities will be intensified on social media platforms and the official website of the Viet Nam National Authority of Tourism,” Head of the Viet Nam National Authority of Tourism Nguyen Trung Khanh added.