Spiritual tourism in Vietnam: issues of rationale and reality

Abstract

The exploitation of spiritual values to develop tourism in Vietnam already formed the value chain of spiritual tourism. The first goal of the value chain of spiritual tourism is increasing benefits for local economy. However, the issue of economic benefits is only one part of the goal of sustainable development. If we only focus on economic benefits and do not care about environmental, cultural and social conservation, we will have to get social and environmental risks. From fieldwork activities with in-depth interviews, participant observation in spiritual tourism destinations of Vietnam, including Sam Mountain - Chau Doc - An Giang, the author had the opportunity to learn and recognize the practice of stakeholders in spiritual tourism. Combined with the secondary sources, the author discusses characteristics, forming conditions and exploitation of spiritual tourism in Vietnam. Since then, based on the perspective of sustainable development, the author makes some recommendations to upgrade the value chain of spiritual tourism.