The 56thASEAN Senior Officials Meeting on Tourism was held virtually between Jul 5-6 under the chairmanship of Nivayakiri Adyani, Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Tourism and Creative Economy of Indonesia with Director General of the Department of Tourism Marketing, Ministry of Information, Culture and Tourism of the Lao PDR Khom Douangchantha present as vice chair.

The meeting reviewed the implementation of ASEAN Tourism Agreement in the first six months of 2022 and exchanged information on Covid-19 prevention and combat and country reopening policy of each member state.

Many ASEAN member states have relaxed travel restrictions to ASEAN and foreign visitors to revive Covid-hit tourism industry.

Participants of the meeting noted that tourism sectors in ASEAN member states continued to work with relevant authorities and businesses to implement the Post-Covid-19 Recovery Plan for ASEAN Tourism adopted early this year to revive the tourism industry and attract more visitors to the region. They agreed to diversify tourism products, promote tourism marketing, tourism standards, tourism connectivity, and digitalization in tourism to ensure tourists can better access information.

They also pledged to continue to work with ASEAN dialogue partners and international organisations to strengthen ASEAN tourism and facilitate people-to-people exchange.

Early this year, the Lao government launched the Green Travel Plan urging local companies to resume their tourism services and announced full reopening of the country in May.

In the first quarter of 2022, the country received more than 626,800 domestic visitors and over 35,980 foreign visitors. Laos is expected to receive a larger number of visitors in the second half of the year.

Source: Lao News Agency