7 countries are to be considered exempt from applying for visa by the Government

The Deputy Prime Minister Hoang Trung Hai has directed departments to assess the political, economic and security impact after exempting visa for Japanese, Korean, Russian tourists and those from 4 North Western countries during the past time.

At the meeting of the state steering committee regarding tourism lately, it has been proposed that the government need to consider and deliver policies in order to enable international tourists to visit Vietnam by means of visa exemption for tourists from some important markets such as Japan, Korea, Russia and 4 North Western countries), adjust their temporary residential period to be 30 days instead of 15 days as before.

The Deputy Prime Minister Hoang Trung Hai has directed Minister of Foreign Affairs, The Department of Culture Sports and Tourism to assess the overall impact of visa exemption for citizens of the above seven countries and specify course of action in the up-coming time, submitted to the government.

In April, Vietnamese Tourism Association h as proposed to the government continuing visa exemption for the seven countries on the condition that the directed Minister of Foreign Affairs suggests that the experiment of freeing visa for the seven countries, which costs Vietnam 50 million USD.

As Mr. Vu The Binh, the Vice president of the tourism association said, unless the government accepts visa exemption, Vietnam has lose its competitive advantage over the countries with open visa  mechanism for foreign tourists. For example, 55 countries benefit from visa exemption in Thailand and 155 countries in Malaysia.

He also said that Vietnam in comparison with neighbouring countries has not been such a tourist attraction yet. In addition to complicated visa procedure, this makes tourists seem to be unimpressed. Furthermore, among the seven countries mentioned above, Korea, Russia and Japan are all potential markets for Vietnamese tourism. In 2012, the sales /revenue gained from tourists of the three countries is 2 billion USD while VAT gained is 200 million USD.