Developing craft village tourism in Hai Duong

Coming to Bat Trang, I not only got to see pottery, buy pottery, and experience pottery making, but also visited the village communal house, the temple, pagoda, and shrine... These relics have been associated with the local people for many years. After that, I also enjoyed unique dishes on the royal tray with squid bamboo shoot soup, shrimp rolls wrapped in betel leaves...

What helps Bat Trang attract more and more tourists and effectively exploit craft village tourism?

Since receiving the decision to recognize the craft village as a tourist destination of Hanoi, the local government has immediately started building a smart tourism model. They have soon set up a separate website to introduce Bat Trang tourism; Bat Trang electronic information portal; deployed many utilities for tourists such as free wifi experience; listening to automatic guides... People have invested in facilities to both produce and welcome visitors. Dishes and trays of food with unique characteristics of Bat Trang are introduced to tourists one by one. The interesting and convenient features of this tourist destination have created the attraction for Bat Trang, showing that there is companionship and effort from the government to each citizen.

Hai Duong has great potential for exploiting craft village tourism. When coming to Hai Duong, in addition to taking tourists to visit the Con Son-Kiep Bac relic site (Chi Linh), the Dao Co eco-tourism site (Thanh Mien), the next stop is often the Chu Dau pottery village (Nam Sach). However, if all tours take tourists to the above locations, tourists will easily get bored while Hai Duong has many craft villages that can be exploited and developed to attract tourists, especially foreign tourists.

We can name some of the craft villages that have been visited by tourists such as: Xuan Neo embroidery (Tu Ky); Dong Giao wooden furniture (Cam Giang), gai cake (Ninh Giang); Hoang Dieu leather shoes... But maybe because these villages have not been invested in, tourism is half-hearted, so they have not really created attractive destinations.

In the provincial planning for the period 2021-2030, with a vision to 2050 approved by the Prime Minister, Hai Duong aims to develop tourism in a sustainable direction, ensuring harmony between tourism development and conservation and promotion of the values ​​of each locality. The province's tourism development plan focuses on exploiting and developing rural and craft village tourism. Craft villages with hundreds of years of tradition in the province such as Chu Dau pottery (Nam Sach), Dong Giao wood (Cam Giang) or Gai cake (Ninh Giang) have been mentioned in this planning.

Hai Duong has 66 industrial and handicraft villages and 1 agricultural village. The province also has many traditional and long-standing occupations with unique characteristics of the Eastern land. Developing craft village tourism brings dual economic benefits, creating jobs and increasing income for people, preserving and conserving traditional cultural values.

To effectively exploit craft village tourism in Hai Duong, first of all, it is necessary to have a specific orientation. First of all, it is necessary to choose craft villages with a lot of potential for product development. Only when the products of the craft villages meet the needs of the market and the people can make a living from their profession, can tourism be exploited well.

The work of protecting, restoring and embellishing historical and cultural relics as well as restoring and developing traditional folk cultural activities in craft villages needs to be focused on, creating a unique cultural identity for the craft villages to create opportunities to attract tourists.

Tourist facilities also need to be exploited such as places to eat, stay, and experience. If the craft village cannot exploit these factors, it is possible to link with nearby localities to develop accompanying services...

When each worker and each family in a craft village, in addition to paying attention to promoting the value of traditional crafts, also knows how to position and promote their brand and exploit the advantages of tourism, they can create "double benefits" for development.