The Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism of central Da Nang city held a programme in Ho Chi Minh City on July 4 to promote MICE (Meetings, Incentives, Conventions, Exhibitions) tourism and introduce its promotion packages there.

During the event, Ho Chi Minh City’s travel companies were introduced to the central locality’s favourable conditions in infrastructure and technology to serve the MICE, a specific form of business tourism that relates to the activities of groups of businesspersons travelling for business purposes and represents a multi-million- dollar segment of tourism worldwide.

Da Nang is home to an international airport with eight domestic routes and 20 international ones, an international seaport which welcomes 700,000 arrivals each year, and 337 accommodation facilities, including 10 five-star and nine four-star hotels and resorts.

The department’s deputy head Tran Chi Cuong said that Da Nang has focused on developing its infrastructure and improving the quality of its tourism products and services in order to ensure a safe and friendly environment for visitors.

In 2014, besides Ho Chi Minh City, the central city will also continue promoting its image to Hanoi and several foreign countries, including Japan, the Republic of Korea, Russia and Thailand.

In the first half of this year, it saw 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