Attaching OCOP products to tours to create breakthroughs

Attaching OCOP products to tourism tours to create a breakthrough is a necessary direction, contributing to positioning destinations for tourists and promoting the consumption of local products.

That is the opinion of businesses and state management agencies in the strategy of developing OCOP products associated with tourism to boost consumption, promote local products, increase value and innovate products in tourism development.

Mr. Lam Ngoc Nham - Chairman of the Board of Directors of Bau May Agricultural - Trade - Tourism Cooperative: "In the OCOP product development strategy of localities, it is necessary to attach it to tourism tours to create a breakthrough, contribute to positioning destinations for tourists, promote product consumption, and contribute to local economic development.

Kill two birds with one stone

According to Mr. Lam Ngoc Nham - Chairman of the Board of Directors of Bau May Agricultural - Trade - Tourism Cooperative, many provinces and cities across the country are currently promoting and rapidly developing quality products that meet OCOP standards "2 stars, 3 stars, 4 stars". This means that it is time for businesses as well as localities to join together to promote, advertise and trade OCOP products to more consumers. However, in domestic consumption, the reality is that businesses and cooperatives are still bringing their products to consumers through traditional channels, such as: supermarkets, markets, convenience stores...

Meanwhile, export is limited because it is a common form and is only one channel. Not to mention, with the current small scale of production, many OCOP products cannot meet the large output of container goods to serve the export market. Therefore, the way out for OCOP products is to find a solution to export through tourism.

“In the OCOP product development strategy of localities, it is necessary to incorporate tourism tours to create breakthroughs, contribute to positioning destinations for tourists, promote product consumption, contribute to local economic development, which is a necessary direction in the current context,” said Mr. Nham.

According to Mr. Nham, according to statistics, all provinces and cities across the country, especially those with coastlines, welcome millions of tourists each year. A simple calculation, if only need to convince this number of visitors to buy local OCOP products, the value brought is extremely large. This not only brings great efficiency in revenue and profit for businesses, but also brings intangible values to localities in promoting tourism to domestic and international friends. Therefore, encouraging OCOP subjects to target tourists, making OCOP products become service products and associated with tourism is a breakthrough step, ensuring the right goal of "killing two birds with one stone".

Sharing the same view, Mr. Pham Ngoc Hai - Chairman of the Tourism Association of Ba Ria - Vung Tau province, said that currently, with the Long Thanh airport project being implemented, when put into operation with a capacity of over 25 million international visitors per year, it will certainly attract a huge number of high-end tourists from all over the world. Therefore, combining products, OCOP associated with tourism to renew products, contributing to exploiting the available potential of localities, is a very noteworthy issue.

Mr. Pham Ngoc Hai - Chairman of the Tourism Association of Ba Ria - Vung Tau province: in the context of tourism in localities still having many limitations in terms of new products and typical products, attaching OCOP products to tours will contribute to supplementing and creating an attractive product chain, diversifying tourism products.

Attaching OCOP products to tours

“In particular, in the context of tourism in localities still having many limitations in terms of new products and typical products, attaching OCOP products to tours will contribute to supplementing and creating attractive product chains, diversifying tourism products. However, for this model to be effective, local authorities need to have open mechanisms and policies, encouraging and creating conditions for businesses producing OCOP products to participate in major programs, festivals, investment promotions... organized by the locality, in order to contribute to positioning destinations for tourists. At the same time, promote communication, promotion and tourism promotion activities, such as: strengthening communication, propaganda, promoting tourism images, destinations, new tourism products associated with local OCOP products on international media channels, websites, social networking platforms (Youtube, Facebook...) and appropriate forms of propaganda and promotion, in order to create a great influence and attract tourists to local tourism. "We have more people in our area," Mr. Hai said.

Assessing the positive aspects of linking OCOP products with tourism tours, Mr. Do Phuoc Trung - Deputy Director of the Department of Tourism of Ba Ria - Vung Tau province (BR-VT), said: In the strategy of bringing OCOP products closer to tourists through tours, it is a long-term solution. Therefore, in addition to promoting communication and promoting OCOP products, functional sectors need to mobilize tourism service businesses to bring OCOP products into tourism. At the same time, promote connecting programs and tourism routes to bring tourists to visit and shop at stores and OCOP product display points in their locality.

“As a locality that attracts a large number of tourists, with more than 13 million visitors/year, BR-VT's OCOP products have a distinct advantage in on-site export compared to other localities. However, to bring OCOP products closer to tourists, OCOP entities also need to pay attention to promoting and advertising their products,” said Mr. Trung.

Citing this combination, Mr. Trung said that recently, the Department of Tourism of Ba Ria - Vung Tau province has chaired, surveyed and announced 230 destinations and built 54 tours. In which, these tours have many destinations that are places where OCOP products of the province are produced. And the development of OCOP products associated with tourism has made BR - VT a more attractive destination. Because, in fact, visitors coming here not only have a vacation, have fun, visit relics, but also have many attractions combined with shopping and experience. This is a new type of tourism that has recently attracted a lot of attention from tourists. Therefore, localities need to promote and improve further in developing new tourism products, associated with OCOP products to create breakthroughs, contributing to developing the tourism industry into a spearhead economic sector and in a sustainable direction.