Vietnam saw a great number of foreign tourists in February 2010 when the country welcomed a long Tet holiday (the Lunar New Year) and is celebrating annual festivals.

Figures released by the General Statistics Office (GSO) of Vietnam showed that the number of foreign visitors to Vietnam reached an estimated 446.323 in February 2010, up 3.5% from the previous month and up 30.2% compared to the same period last year.

Most of the visitors came from China, the U.S, the Republic of Korea (RoK), Japan, Taiwan (China), and Australia.

Specifically, China leads the number of foreign visitors to Vietnam with 69,358, a 1.7% rise from the previous month and a 90.8% rise compared to the same period last year.

GSO said that this month, the number of foreign visitors to Vietnam for visiting relatives still increased while those for tourism and business decreased slightly. More than 75,500 people came Vietnam to visit relatives, rising by 42.8% from the previous month.

In the first days of Tet holiday, Vietnam welcomed numerous maritime tourists with popular routes to Nha Trang, Ho Chi Minh City, Danang, Halong Bay, and Hanoi.

With the national tourism year 2010 in Hanoi and the Thang Long – Hanoi 1,000^th anniversary, the country targets at 4.2-4.5 million foreign tourists in 2010.

(Source: CPV)