Open visa, extend stay for tourists
More than 20 years ago, when working with experts from the World Tourism Organization to survey and develop a plan for Phu Quoc, we proposed outstanding policies, even considered "crazy" such as extending the power grid to the island and allowing international visitors from all over the world to come to Phu Quoc without a visa. Reality has proven that these are the most important policies that have brought tourism to the pearl island to develop remarkably to this day.
Looking back, Phu Quoc tourism planning at all three time points - 2003, 2004 and most recently 2024 (Phu Quoc City Master Plan to 2040) all aim to turn Phu Quoc into a high-quality, international-class tourist destination.
This goal requires appropriate responses with specific mechanisms and policies for the island, which cannot be the same as mainland destinations. Specifically, visas have been opened, and need to be opened further, and made further breakthroughs. More and more international visitors come to Phu Quoc to stay for long periods of time, so the time allowed for their stay needs to be extended. For visa policies to be effective, more flights need to be opened, connecting Phu Quoc directly with many countries.
In particular, a high-quality, regional and international tourism center cannot be separated from the environmental story. Until now, Phu Quoc still does not have a professional waste and wastewater treatment center, which is an extremely big shortcoming. This is not only a tourism issue but also serves the people's livelihood, an extremely important issue for the islands. It is necessary to quickly build a large-scale, high-tech waste treatment center.
In addition, the Master Plan to 2040 sets the target of Phu Quoc's population reaching 680,000 people, welcoming 14.6 million international visitors; but with a maximum clean water supply of only 200,000 m3/day and night, it certainly cannot meet the demand. For island tourism, domestic water is the upper limit factor, regulating the tourist capacity of the island.
No matter how big the island is, how many resources it has, if it lacks clean water, it cannot bring in water boats to serve tourists every day. Among the international visitors Phu Quoc aims to attract, there are super-rich visitors who use very few resources and little water. Therefore, in parallel with mobilizing resources to invest in water supply infrastructure from the mainland to the island, there needs to be a policy to change the structure of visitors, focus on welcoming super-rich visitors and limit spontaneous immigration, ensuring the island's capacity.
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