Travel firms in dire need of Russian-speaking tour guides

The scarcity of Russian- and Korean-speaking tour guides is getting more severe in the near future as the number of visitors from these two markets is rising sharply, with Anh Duong Tourist Company alone saying it needs an additional 150 Russian-speaking tour guides next year.

Hoang Thi Phong Thu, chairwoman of Anh Duong which joins hands with its foreign partner Pegas Touristik to take Russian visitors to Vietnam, informed that her company had only been able to gather 50 Russian-speaking tour guides despite efforts to look for them around the country.

The tour guide number is too small compared to the 150,000 Russian travelers that Anh Duong has welcomed this year, forcing the company to hire English-speaking tour guides to pick up Russian visitors or see them off at the airport although most Russian customers do not understand the language.

Also, Anh Duong has supported several localities favored by Russian travelers in training the Russian language for their tourism workers but it has still failed to meet such a strong demand.

“We have had to go to Hanoi to look for Russian-speaking tour guides but there are not enough eligible members. Pegas Touristik plans to take 250,000 Russian visitors to Vietnam next year, meaning we will need an additional 150 tour guides then. This is really tough,” she complained.

According to Nguyen Duc Chi, deputy head of the travel division of the HCMC Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism, the city has around 100 recognized Russian-speaking tour guides who are working for tourism enterprises nationwide. Similarly, the number of tour guides speaking Korean and German among others is also limited compared to the number of visitors coming from such markets, he noted.

As for the Korean market, the city welcomed roughly 200,000 visitors last year but there are less than 10 tour guides speaking Korean to do the job. The lack of tour guides is also one of the reasons why companies catering to Korean visitors use Korean tour guides in Vietnam despite knowing that this goes against the Tourism Law.

To avoid breaking the law, some enterprises have no other choices but to resort to a much more costly way.

In related news, the plan by Anh Duong Tourist Company to carry Russian visitors to Phu Quoc on chartered flights set for late this month had to be delayed until February as there are not enough hotel rooms for tourists on the island.

Hoang Thi Phong Thu, chairwoman of Anh Duong, said that several tours sold to Russian visitors to take them to Phu Quoc as scheduled were cancelled and delayed until her firm found out enough hotel rooms.

“The first chartered flight is expected to fly to Phu Quoc on February 13 when the island’s hotel rooms are available. The chartered flights using Boeing airplanes will carry Russian travelers there regularly throughout the year,” she said.

Tours to Phu Quoc lasting for 12 days are now offered to Russia tourists, Thu said, adding that the sale of longer tours with the same destination would be continued in the coming time.

Source: SGT