Article 1.- To approve the Scheme on orientations and solutions for accelerating tourism development in the Central Vietnam-Central Highland region (including the provinces and centrally-run cities of Thanh Hoa, Nghe An, Ha Tinh, Quang Binh, Quang Tri, Thua Thien Hue, Da Nang, Quang Nam, Quang Ngai, Binh Dinh, Phu Yen, Khanh Hoa, Ninh Thuan, Binh Thuan, Gia Lai, Kon Tum, Dak Lak, Dak Nong, and Lam Dong) from now till 2010 with the following major contents:

1. Major objectives:

a/ General objectives:

- On the basis of potentials and advantages in marine tourism, cultural-historical tourism and ecological tourism, to accelerate tourism development in the Central Vietnam-Central Highland provinces, combining tourism development with the conservation and promotion of national cultural identities, developing tourism into a key sector, creating a motive force for boosting socio-economic development in each locality, carrying out hunger eradication and poverty alleviation, and firmly maintaining security, national defense as well as social order and safety.

- To strive for the target that from 2010 on, tourism shall play the role of one of spearhead economic sectors of the Central Vietnam-Central Highland provinces and a motive force for boosting tourism development in the whole country.

b/ Specific objectives:

- By 2010, the Central Vietnam-Central Highland region will receive around 2.5 million arrivals of international tourists and around 10 million arrivals of domestic tourists.

- Earnings from tourism shall increase by 6.2 times over the 2000's figure.

- In the 2006-2010 period, the average growth rate of earnings from tourism shall be 20-22%/year.

- The number of jobs created in the tourism sector shall increase by 5'6 times over the 2000's figure.

2. Orientations for tourism development in the Central Vietnam-Central Highland region:

a/ Tourist areas:

- Provinces from Thanh Hoa to Ha Tinh: To concentrate on exploiting their potentials and advantages in historical, cultural and marine tourism with a tourist center being Vinh city and its neighboring areas.

- Provinces and cities from Quang Binh and Quang Ngai: To concentrate on exploiting their potentials and advantages in cultural heritages, especially those that have been ranked as world heritages, historical and revolutionary relics, and natural values of mountainous and sea areas for tourism development. To invest in the construction of marine tourist resorts and marine sport, recreation and entertainment centers up to international standards. To attach importance to the development of tourism along the East-West corridor. Tourist centers shall be Thua Thien Hue province, Da Nang city, Hoi An ancient city and My Son vestige.

- Provinces from Binh Dinh to Binh Thuan: To develop tourism mostly based on the promotion of potentials and advantages regarding marine tourism. To invest in the construction of large-scale marine tourist resorts with modern equipment so as to meet the demands of high-income tourists. To develop forms of tourism capable of satisfying tourists' diversified demands for long stays by designing tours combining the marine eco-system in southern central coastal provinces with the forest and mountainous eco-systems as well as cultural identities of Khmer and other ethnic minorities in the Central Highlands. Tourist centers shall be Nha Trang and Phan Thiet cities.

- Central Highland provinces (Gia Lai, Kon Tum, Dak Lak, Dak Nong and Lam Dong): To accelerate tourism development by promoting potentials and advantages regarding eco-tourism in forests, mountains, caves, waterfalls, lakes, etc. and traditional culture of Central Highland ethnic minorities in combination with the cultures of the southern central coastal provinces. A tourism center shall be Da Lat city.

b/ Tourist routes:

- Coastal tourist routes along National Highway No. 1: To concentrate on exploiting tourist potentials and advantages of cultural, historical and revolutionary relics, ecological, recreational, and marine sport resorts, and world heritages, and tourist centers (Sam Son, Cua Lo, Hue, Hoi An, Nha Trang and Phan Thiet) along National Highway No. 1 from Thanh Hoa to Binh Thuan province, so as to form and develop tourist resorts capable of meeting diversified demands of high-income tourists such as: Canh Duong-Hai Van-Non Nuoc tourist resort (Thue Thien Hue-Da Nang), Nha Trang Bay tourist resort (Khanh Hoa province), Kim Lien tourist resort (Nghe An province), Thien Cam tourist resort (Ha Tinh province), Phong Nha-Ke Bang tourist resort (Quang Binh province), Hoi An tourist resort in association with My Son vestige (Quang Nam province), Phan Thiet-Mui Ne tourist resort (Binh Thuan province), Phuong Mai-Nui Ba tourist resort (Binh Dinh province), etc.

- To develop tourist routes on the basis of exploiting tourist values of cultural-historical relics, war relics and world heritages (Kim Lien cultural-historical relic, Phong Nha-Ke Bang National Park, war relics and former demilitarization zone (Quang Tri province), Hue royal capital, My Son vestige and Hoi An ancient city) so as to create unique and attractive tours for accelerating tourism development.

- To develop ecological and cultural tourist routes in Central Highland provinces (Kon Tum - Gia Lai ' Dak Lak ' Dak Nong ' Lam Dong) on the basis of promoting tourist values of Da Lat city, Dan Kia ' Suoi Vang tourist resort, Tuyen Lam lake tourist resort (Da Lat city, Lam Dong province), and Don hamlet tourist resort (Dak Lak province).

- To exploit tourist values of the Ho Chi Minh Trail revolutionary and historical relic for tourism development.

- To exploit ecological, historical and recreational tourist resorts and spots in seaside and mountainous areas by means of transport by land along National Highways No. 8, 9, 12 and 40 via the international border-gates of Cau Treo (Ha Tinh province), Lao Bao (Quang Tri province), Cha Lo (Quang Binh province), Bo Y (Kon Tum province), etc.

c/ To develop infrastructure in service of tourism development:

- Roads: Apart from building roads in service of socio-economic development, it is necessary to build road sections serving long tourist itineraries and set up service stations (car parking and maintenance, catering services, sale of souvenirs, and toilets) with a reasonable distance apart along the roads.

- To design open tours and exploit international flights to the Central Vietnam-Central Highland region as well as direct domestic flights between big cities and the Central Vietnam-Central Highland region; to upgrade and renovate railway stations and trains, and raise the quality of services so as to increase the number of tourists traveling by rail.

- To study and design tours by sea to Central Vietnam provinces, including tours linking to ASEAN and other countries. It is necessary to plan and upgrade big seaports to accommodate international tourist ships of big tonnage and have facilities for serving tourists.

- To improve material-technical foundations in international border-gates so as to better serve tourists.

d/ Tourist material-technical foundations:

To raise the quality of services in accommodation establishments; to predict the demands for accommodations and tourist accommodation establishments in the 2006-2010 period and subsequent years, serving the formulation of plans for development of accommodation establishments (hotels) to be publicized in each locality and region, so as to meet tourists' increasing demands. To plan the development of high-grade convalescent hotels in seaside tourist resorts and tourist cities. To encourage and create conditions for local communities to participate in the development of material-technical foundations for tourism, satisfy tourists' demands for learning about Vietnam's cultural characteristics, overcome seasonal accommodation difficulties, and create jobs and raise incomes for local people.

In big tourist centers, it is necessary to build large-scale entertainment and recreation parks.

e/ Tourist promotion and propagation

Tourist promotion and propagation constitutes an important task aiming to accelerate tourism development in the Central Vietnam-Central Highland region, first of all, focusing on particular products of ecological and cultural tourism and humane values in association with sport and entertainment tourism, recreational tourism in seaside and mountainous areas, and brands of the Central Vietnam-Central Highland region (the Heritage Road, the Legendary Road ' Ho Chi Minh Trail, Hue royal capital, Nha Trang city, Da Lat city, Central Highland green road, war relics and demilitarization zone (DMZ tours), and caravan tours. To promote Central Vietnam-Central Highland tourism at home and abroad, first of all, tourist products of high competitiveness as compared to regional countries; to take appropriate measures to mobilize resources for promoting tourism in the Central Vietnam-Central Highland region.

3. Solutions and policies to develop tourism in the Central Vietnam-Central Highland region

a/ To enhance the planning and management of tourism development:

Provinces and cities in the Central Vietnam-Central Highland region shall take initiative in adjusting and supplementing their tourism development plans on the principle of integrating them with local and national socio-economic development plans and making them comply with the master plan on Vietnam's tourism development in the 1995-2010 period. Local tourism development plans must be associated with regional and inter-regional tourism development plans, conservation of the nature, protection of the ecological environment, and land-use plans. Detailed plans must be formulated for national tourist resorts and approved by competent agencies before being implemented. In cases where domestic agencies are not capable of formulating plans for large, modern tourist resorts and key tourist areas of high-quality and strategic importance to the national tourism development as well as local, regional and national socio-economic development, foreign specialists may be hired to make such plans.

b/ To invest in tourism development:

To adopt appropriate mechanisms and policies on capital, human resource, land and taxation, mobilize foreign investment, issue project bonds and reform administrative formalities for all economic sectors, at home and abroad, to invest in tourism development in the Central Vietnam-Central Highland region.

Based on their budget capacity and demands for investment in tourism development, each province and city in the Central Vietnam-Central Highland region shall take initiative in allocating funds, and at the same time, adopt appropriate mechanisms and policies to lawfully mobilize resources for investment in tourism development.

The Ministry of Planning and Investment, the Ministry of Finance and the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism must, in the process of allocating capital from the central budget and other sources for investment in tourist infrastructure, give priority to Central Vietnam-Central Highland provinces.

c/ To boost tourism promotion and propagation

To formulate annual programs on promotion and propagation of tourism in the Central Vietnam-Central Highland region with specific topics, in association with national tourism promotion and propagation, and at the same time, to coordinate with mass media, external information agencies and Vietnamese diplomatic missions in foreign countries in promoting tourism in this region in foreign countries.

To promote the provision of information and guidance to tourists coming to Vietnam right at international border-gates and big tourist centers of the region.

d/ To develop human resources: To formulate plans on training and development of human resources for tourism, meeting the regional development requirements. To train qualified tourist guides satisfying requirements of development and international integration. To encourage universities located in the Central Vietnam-Central Highland region to train in tourism, especially through distance training programs. To encourage all economic sectors to participate in training human resources for tourism in people-founded and semi-public forms'

e/ To enhance the State management over tourism: Provinces and centrally-run cities in the Central Vietnam-Central Highland region shall have to raise functional agencies' capability of managing tourism development through formulating and managing the implementation of tourism development plans in each locality and the whole region so as to attain the general objectives.

Article 2.- Organization of implementation

1. The Vietnam National Administration of Tourism shall have to assume the prime responsibility for, and coordinate with concerned ministries, branches and localities in the Central Vietnam-Central Highland region in, implementing the Prime Minister's Decision approving the scheme on orientations and solutions for accelerating tourism development in the Central Vietnam-Central Highland region.

2. The Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Planning and Investment shall coordinate with concerned ministries and branches in promulgating according to their respective competence mechanisms and policies in conformity with the State guidelines so as to facilitate tourism development in the Central Vietnam-Central Highland region, first of all, to create capital and human resources in order to tap all resources for tourism development.

3. The Ministry of Transport shall assume the prime responsibility for, and coordinate with the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism in, formulating a plan on building tourist service stations along major national highways; upgrade and renovate material-technical foundations and raise the quality of railway, sea and airline services for the purposes of developing tourism in the Central Vietnam-Central Highland region.

4. Other ministries and branches shall, on the basis of their respective functions and tasks, to assume the prime responsibility for, or participate in, the implementation of this Decision.

5. The People's Committees of provinces and centrally-run cities in the Central Vietnam-Central Highland region:

a/ To assume the prime responsibility for, or participate in, the implementation of this Decision.

b/ Basing themselves on the master plan for Vietnam's tourism development in the 1995-2010 period and this Decision, to adjust their local tourism development plans to suit these documents and to closely manage the investment in projects on tourism development and tourist promotion and propagation according to such plans.

Article 3.- This Decision takes effect 15 days after its publication in "CONG BAO".

The ministers, the heads of ministerial-level agencies and Government-attached agencies, the presidents of the People's Committees of provinces and centrally-run cities in the Central Vietnam-Central Highland region shall have to implement this Decision.