An Giang benefits from applying agricultural tourism model

In the recent years, the agricultural tourism model in An Giang has created attractive income sources to bring better life for many farmers in the province.

In the period 2007-2009, to help Vietnamese farmers to get more jobs and increase their income, Agriterra (an agricultural organization from the Netherlands) in cooperation with the Vietnam Farmers' Association implemented the agricultural tourism project in Lao Cai, Tien Giang and An Giang provinces with €390,000 funding capital. After three-years of implementation (first period), Agriterra assessed An Giang as the most effective implementer and decided to continue to invest in the second period (2011-2014).

Most of the funding capital has been spent on training professional skills on tourism services for farmers; investing to upgrade, build bedrooms, toilets, repair boats, equip life-jackets, tandem bicycle, improve fish ponds… to serve needs of tourists.

According to statistics, over the years, the number of tourists participating in the agricultural tourism program in An Giang has significantly grown. In 2008, An Giang welcomed 1,000 tourist arrivals. In 2009, 2010, 2011, the numbers were 2,000; 4,000 and 7,000 tourist arrivals respectively. And in the first quarter of 2012, An Giang welcomed 3,000 tourist arrivals (1/10 of which was international tourists). At the same time, the income of the farmers involving in the project also obviously improved from VND 2 million to VND 5-6 million per household per month, especially there were many households earning VND 10-20 million per household per month. The project also contributed to change the rural life in An Giang.

On February 2012, An Giang Agricultural Tourism Center was established to promote and facilitate agricultural tourism activities in the locality. The center aims to connect tourists with farmers, promote agricultural tourism, train and guide farmers to manage product quality and tourism plans…The motto of the center is to welcome visitors to An Giang to participate in activities in daily life of local people as working, cooking and harvesting agricultural products...

Currently, the center has opened attractive tourist routes such as: visiting the Uncle Ton relic site, floating market and Long Xuyen village by boats; fishing, silt mud bath in the river; visiting and enjoying fruit gardens; visiting ancient houses and enjoying homestay service; visiting Tra Su forest…