Binh Thuan strives to address shortage of tourism workers post-pandemic

 

The south-central province of Binh Thuan, one of the popular tourist destinations in Vietnam, has issued a plan for the training and development of the tourism workforce from 2022 – 2025, with a vision towards 2030, in an effort to revive the pandemic-stricken industry.

The COVID-19 has forced local tourism businesses to cut 50-70% of their staff in order to deal with a sharp decline in tourist arrivals and revenue from the industry over the last two years. With many workers having shifted to other jobs, tourism services providers in Binh Thuan are facing serious labour shortage post-pandemic when travel recovers.

Binh Thuan is suffering severe labour shortage in tourism with more than 60% of lodging facilities understaffed, according to a survey of 75 company members of the Binh Thuan Tourism Association. Only 70% of the workers have been trained professionally.

Under the new plan, the province sets to have 75% of full-time tourism workers receive professional training and 75% proficient in a foreign languages by 2025. The figures will be 85% and 80%, respectively, by 2030.

Tourism firms and vocational schools in Binh Thuan are also cooperating in providing short-term training courses for workers in an attempt to quickly fill the gap and sustainably develop the industry.

Binh Thuan welcomed 2.9 million visitors in the first seven months of 2022, a surge of 67.3% against the same period last year. Tourism turnover rose by 38.5% year-on-year to total 5.4 trillion VND (230.72 million USD)./.