Over the past year, the complicated situation of the COVID-19 pandemic has negatively affected the tourism sector and hospitality industry. Most small and medium enterprises have to transfer their business or change their business lines due to financial difficulties. There are several supportive policies from the government but have not reached companies and workers in time. Meanwhile, the market is constantly unstable because tourists prioritize safety over entertainment. Therefore, the tourism sector determines to perform dual tasks that are ensuring safety and maintaining operations to create recovery momentum. According to some experts, domestic tourism will be an important lever for the industry to recover in 2021, in which safety remains the top priority.

Ms. Nguyen Thi Tia, Deputy Director of Vietsun Tourist, Can Tho, shared her thought: “When consulting and communicating with customers, we always provide them information about safe destinations. Most tourists tend to travel in small groups or families for a short period of 2-3 days”. In fact, this trend (short tours, small groups tour, free&easy, etc.) is becoming popular and widely chosen by tourists. Grasping this opportunity, tourist agencies and companies have also increased investment in building more suitable products such as newly discovered destinations, private areas, diversifying specialized services, and so on.

Businesses do not focus on large-scale investment, they prefer small investments for risk spreading and sharing instead. Tourist agencies often focus on private resorts or services with a limited number of users. On this basis, many tourism products related to healthcare or close to nature are born and become popular such as ecology tourism, yoga tourism, sports tourism, medical tourism, or agricultural tourism. Besides, tourism products that aim at experiences, environmental resources protection, and preservation of the core values of indigenous culture are also increasing in quantity and quality. In Can Tho, tourist firms such as Victoria, Can Tho Ecolodge, Azerai resort ... have operated many tourism programs following this trend such as daycation, wellness cruise, family getaways, staycation, etc.

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the tourism sector is forced to restructure for adaptation, from promotional activities and positioning the target market to building suitable products. In particular, the domestic market with proactive tourism trends (tourists choose their favorite services and tours rather than following the proposed schedule from travel agencies) is gradually promoting the tourism industry to change in the direction of applying digital technology. Digital transformation helps travel companies reach more customers, take better care of visitors, reduce costs and increase business efficiency. For customers, the selection of services also becomes more convenient and appropriate. Mobile applications allow visitors to get more information, perform transaction operations, and integrate many other utilities. Searching for information about destinations and selecting tour guides, hotels, restaurants, and other services also become more active and do not require direct interaction. Therefore, travel firms must have more diversified services, connections and become more competitive.

The tourism industry is facing more challenges than ever before and is forced to change in many aspects. Most of the international travel businesses have closed down and converted to another form, while service providers must be dynamic with a variety of policies and solutions that can adapt to each situation. In each locality, depending on the situation, appropriate solutions will be developed to both keep safe and restore tourism activities.