Foreign visitor numbers surged by 80.9 percent in October compared with the previous month, totalling 518,477, the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism said.

The figure increased by 17.8 percent compared with October last year.

Of those, about 445,612 international visitors arrived by plane, accounting for 85.9 percent of the total visitors; 1,500 by sea, 0.3 percent; 71,365 by road, 13.8 percent.

The number of foreign visitors to Vietnam by plane increased by 24.6 percent in comparison with the same period last year while the number of international visitors arriving by sea and road decreased 66.7 percent and 8.5 percent respectively.

About 314,000 international tourists came to Vietnam for a holiday, a rise of 21.1 percent compared with October last year. About 86,305 visitors arrived for business purposes, a decline of 0.1 percent.

In the first 10 months of the year, of a total 4.83 million international tourists to Vietnam , 2.9 million visitors came for tourism purposes.

During the same period, the country saw the highest increase from Cambodia , 56.9 percent, followed by China , 45.8 percent, Malaysia , 11.7 percent and Japan 8.5 percent.

The number of foreign visitors from the Republic of Korea , Taiwan , France , Australia , the US was also on the rise. Only the number of visitors from Thailand declined (20.7 percent) in comparison with the same period past year. /.

TTA0111.011 (KT) Financial advisory committee formed
Hanoi , Nov. 1 (VNA) — Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung has set up a national advisory committee on financial and monetary policy that will include high-ranking Government officials and prominent economists.

Meeting once per quarter, it will consult with the Prime Minister on economic policy directions and will also evaluate the effectiveness of existing financial and monetary policies.

The committee will be headed by Deputy Prime Minister Vu Van Ninh. State Bank of Vietnam Governor Nguyen Van Binh will serve as permanent vice chairman and Vu Viet Ngoan, chairman of the National Financial Supervision Committee, will serve as vice chairman. The committee's 22 other members will include ministers, deputy ministers and heads of related Government agencies. /.