Hanoi links cultural industry with "Creative City"

After more than 3 years of implementation, Resolution No. 09-NQ/TU, dated February 22, 2022 of the Hanoi Party Committee on developing cultural industry in the capital for the period 2021-2025, with a vision to 2030 and vision to 2045, has created breakthroughs, helping the capital gradually realize the goal of becoming a center of cultural and creative industry of the country and the region.

Scene of the World Cultural Festival in Hanoi 2025 at the Thang Long Imperial Citadel Heritage Center.

Pioneer in developing cultural industry

The development of cultural industry is a strong trend, an important driving force for the socio -economic development of many countries in the world. In Vietnam, cultural industry is also identified as a key economic sector to create momentum for the development of other economic sectors.

Resolution No. 33-NQ/TU, dated June 9, 2014 of the 11th Party Central Committee on building and developing Vietnamese culture and people to meet the requirements of sustainable national development sets out the requirement: "Building a healthy cultural market, promoting the development of cultural industries, and enhancing the promotion of Vietnamese culture".

Thoroughly implementing the Party's viewpoint, on June 8, 2016, the Prime Minister signed and issued Decision No. 1755/QD-TTg approving the Strategy for the development of Vietnam's cultural industries to 2020, with a vision to 2030, which affirmed that cultural industries are an important component of the national economy.

In response to the demands and requirements of the times, Hanoi is the first locality in the country to issue a separate resolution - Resolution No. 09-NQ/TU, which sets the goal that by 2030, the capital's cultural industry will basically become a spearhead economic sector, strongly promoting the development of other sectors and fields.

Hanoi is among the cities with leading cultural industries, prestigious brands and products, and high competitiveness compared to other cities in the region; a "Creative City" with influence in Southeast Asia. Strive for revenue from cultural industries to increase gradually each year, contributing about 8% of the city's GRDP by 2030 and 10% by 2045.

Notably, Resolution No. 09-NQ/TU has clearly defined 13 key areas that Hanoi will focus on implementing, including: Cultural tourism; Performing arts; Handicrafts; Design; Advertising; Fine arts, photography and exhibitions; Cinema; Fashion; Cuisine; Software and entertainment games; Television and Radio; Publishing.

According to Associate Professor Dr. Bui Hoai Son, Standing Member of the National Assembly's Committee on Culture and Education, Resolution No. 09-NQ/TU sets out clear goals and directions with specific policies for each roadmap, clearly demonstrating the development aspirations of the Capital.

After more than 3 years of implementing Resolution No. 09-NQ/TU, the picture of the capital's cultural industry has improved a lot. Many tourism products associated with the cultural industry have been launched, becoming a model to create momentum for new creations.

Typically, Hanoi has built a series of products to exploit the value of relics, heritages, and traditional craft villages; announced more than 20 night tourism products, becoming a leading locality in developing night tourism, notably the tour "Sacred Night" at Hoa Lo Prison relic, "Essence of Confucianism" at Van Mieu - Quoc Tu Giam, "Ngoc Son Mysterious Night" at Ngoc Son Temple...

In recent years, Hanoi has continuously received awards for "Vietnam's Leading Cultural Destination", "Asia's Leading City Destination 2024", "Asia's Leading Short-Term City Destination 2024", etc., thereby affirming its position, image and cultural - tourism brand in the international arena.

The implementation of Resolution No. 09-NQ/TU also creates momentum for the Capital to promote the brand of "Creative City" with more and more new attractive creative spaces being born. Hanoi also forms large-scale cultural and creative festivals, attracting tens of thousands, even millions of participants. Typical examples are the Hanoi Creative Design Festival, Hanoi Ao Dai Tourism Festival, Hanoi Food Festival, Hanoi Tourism Gift Festival, Hanoi Autumn Festival... and recently the Hanoi World Cultural Festival.

In the field of performance, Hanoi is gradually asserting itself as a major performing arts center of the country, moving towards becoming a regional performing arts and entertainment center, with a series of well-invested, quality art programs, and large-scale cultural works. These include the Vietnam Exhibition Center (Dong Anh commune), Hoan Kiem Theater, and soon the Hanoi Opera House by West Lake...

Awakening creative aspirations

As someone who closely follows the cultural development activities of the capital, Chief Representative of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in Vietnam Jonathan Wallace Baker commented that for a long time, Hanoi has been a bridge between cultures, a place where traditional values intersect with creativity.

“UNESCO understands that, although Hanoi is proud of its past, it still wants to look to the future. We believe that the city has all the conditions to become a creative center, because creativity is the core of culture and Hanoi possesses a cultural soul,” said Mr. Jonathan Wallace Baker.

Hanoi is gradually asserting itself as the country’s cultural and creative industrial center. However, to maintain its leading position, Hanoi still has many challenges to overcome.

According to Chairman of the UNESCO Hanoi Association Truong Minh Tien, despite the breakthrough in the cultural field, the capital still faces many challenges from uneven social awareness of the cultural industry; creative human resources in management skills, copyright, and digital technology are still lacking and weak; many traditional cultural heritages are at risk of being lost in the whirlwind of market development.

To develop Hanoi into a regional cultural and creative industrial center, Mr. Truong Minh Tien said that Hanoi needs to perfect institutions and special incentive policies, create a favorable legal corridor for cultural and creative enterprises, encourage socialized investment; build synchronous creative infrastructure, form "cultural industrial parks", "urban creative centers" in suburban areas, such as: Dong Anh, Gia Lam, Long Bien...

According to Associate Professor Dr. Do Van Tru, Chairman of the Vietnam Cultural Heritage Association, to promote cultural resources for socio-economic development, Hanoi needs to pay attention to preserving and conserving the values of Thang Long traditional culture, relics and heritages left by our ancestors; from there, there will be decentralization, systematic overall planning, and encouragement of new creations on the foundation of a thousand-year-old cultural tradition.

Currently, to promote the capital's cultural industry to develop as expected and realize the vision of turning Hanoi into a regional cultural industry center, the city has issued many important policies.

In addition to Resolution No. 09-NQ/TU, Hanoi continues to implement Resolution No. 24/2025/NQ-HDND dated July 10, 2025 of the City People's Council on the organization and operation of the Cultural Industry Center in the area; Resolution No. 25/2025/NQ-HDND of the City People's Council on the commercial and cultural development zone in the city.

Most recently, the Political Report of the 17th City Party Executive Committee presented to the 18th Congress of the Hanoi Party Committee set out a number of requirements and tasks to promote cultural values and build elegant and civilized Hanoians, stating: "Developing cultural industry into a key economic sector associated with tourism development, positioning unique products in the strengths of the capital, such as: Design, cultural tourism, cuisine, performing arts, handicrafts, cinema, publishing, advertising, software and entertainment games".

These guiding documents and resolutions clearly demonstrate the strong aspiration of the Capital in creating new creative spaces, expanding modern cultural infrastructure, creating momentum for the cultural industry to develop comprehensively, sustainably and in depth. This is also the solid foundation for Hanoi to become a regional creative city, affirming its position as the leading cultural industry center of Vietnam and Southeast Asia.

Source: https://hanoimoi.vn/ha-noi-gan-cong-nghiep-van-hoa-voi-thanh-pho-sang-tao-719794.html