Asean seeks strategy for tourism
ASEAN is calling for bids from experienced consultants to create the region’s “Tourism Marketing Strategy 2017-2020”, said Tran Phu Cuong, acting director-general of the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism and coordinator of the bids.
An overall budget of US$30,000 (about Bt1 million) will be assigned. The deadline for the submission of proposals is August 19, with the service agreement to be signed by September 9.
The presentation and adoption of the final version of the marketing strategy is scheduled to take place in mid-2017 ahead of a meeting in Vietnam of Asean heads of national tourism organisations.
The Tourism Marketing Strategy will follow on from the “Visit Asean@50: Golden Celebration” campaign that will be rolled out in 2017 to mark 50 years of Asean.
The marketing strategy will also sit within the framework of the already adopted “Asean Tourism Strategic Plan 2016-2025”.
The scope of work for the marketing plan includes a market-research programme that will analyse Asean’s current market positioning and confirm likely future patterns and trends for visiting the region.
Specific deliverables of the marketing plan include a competitive analysis of tourism in Asean; vision, objectives, goals and targets; market-research findings on aspects such as purpose of trip and length of stay; branding, logo and tagline; action plans; budget requirements and resourcing; monitoring and evaluation; and an implementation timetable.
“The consultants will be experienced in working across multicultural settings, and be willing to think and act creatively and strategically, and produce innovative tourism solutions,” Cuong said.
Asean women
Adrienne Woltersdorf, director of UN Women and the German political foundation Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (FES), said Asean women had the potential to boost the region’s labour force and economy.
“Asean economies have potentially vast numbers of skilled and unskilled female workers that are not being fully included,” she said.
Economic growth across Asean’s 10 member states has averaged 5 per cent a year, and the job market for the population of 622 million is estimated to be worth $2.6 trillion annually. But women’s lack of equal opportunities cost the region’s economies an estimated 18 per cent of gross domestic product, or almost half a billion dollars, in 2015.
