Since the beginning of August, the central city of Da Nang has seen a recovery in the number of tourists, compared with the two previous months, thanks to the resumption of several foreign flights and the opening of two new ones.

In July, the national flag carrier Vietnam Airlines reopened the chartered flight air route connecting the city and China’s Hangzhou with the frequency of two flights per week, according to Tran Chi Cuong, Deputy Director of the municipal Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism.

Flights from China’s Xian, Kunming and Chengdu to the city were also resumed in August while a direct route linking with Malaysia’s Kuala Lumpur is expected to offer services again later this month, he added.

The launching of the Da Nang-Narita (Japan) direct air route and a domestic one to the Mekong Delta city of Can Tho has also helped bring more visitors to Da Nang.

To better its services, the city has paid much attention to upgrading tourism infrastructure and improving hotel service quality. Recently, Novotel Danang Premiere Han River was recognised the five-star hotel.

Apart from its traditional markets such as China, the Republic of Korea and Russia, the tourism sector is eyeing new ones, including Japan, Thailand and North Europe, in order to obtain the target of welcoming more than 800,000 foreign tourists in 2014 and 1 million in the following year.

In the first half of this year, Da Nang greeted more than 1.7 million tourist arrivals, up 15.8 percent from the same period last year. Of this, the number of foreigners topped 450,600, a year-on-year rise of 15.7 percent.-VNA