Travel firms and tourism-related service providers should take the lead in making efforts to reduce plastic waste and call on others to join them, said Vu The Binh, chairman of the Vietnam Tourism Association.

He made this statement at the 'Reducing Plastic Waste in the Tourism Industry' seminar on Thursday afternoon in Hanoi, as part of the ongoing Vietnam International Travel Mart-VITM Hanoi 2023.

Environmental pollution facing tourist attractions has been a matter of concern for a long time, but the issue has yet to be tackled with drastic measures.

Tourism businesses need to take action to cope with environmental pollution in their areas before calling for the participation of other stakeholders in the field such as authorities and organizations, Binh said.

In the upcoming period, the Vietnam Tourism Association will launch a project called 'Reducing Plastic Waste in the Tourism Industry in Vietnam,' in coordination with the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment and the United Nations Development Program in Vietnam.

The project will be piloted at some popular destinations in Ninh Binh and Quang Nam Provinces.

Speaking at the seminar, Vu My Hanh, representative of a working team in charge of the at-source management of waste in Hoi An City, Quang Nam Province, underlined the importance of sorting waste at source.

Statistics from the natural resources and environment authority in Hoi An showed that the city discharged nearly 37,200 metric tons of waste during the tourism peak in 2019, equivalent to roughly 101 metric tons of waste per day.

Thanks to great efforts of the entire city to develop zero-waste tourism, Hoi An has been honored as one of the top four green destinations in Asia.

The city teamed up with a number of businesses to sort waste at source thoroughly, Hanh said.

Up to now, over 50 tourism businesses pledged to take action to reduce plastic waste and contribute to developing Hoi An into a green destination, she added.

Pham Ha, CEO at Lux Group, a provider of yacht services in Ha Long Bay, said the bay is a UNESCO-listed natural world heritage site but it is littered with piles of rubbish.

Also, while tourists are increasingly environmentally aware, the management of popular destinations in the country remains slack, Ha said.

The Lux Group executive attributed the pollution facing Ha Long Bay to the locality’s inadequate management of this tourist site.

Operators of tourist attractions in Vietnam should be more responsible in jointly transforming the country into a green destination, he suggested.

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