Destination Responses to COVID-19 Waves: Is “Green Zone” Initiative a Holy Grail for Tourism Recovery?

Da Van Huynh, Long Hai Duong, Thuy Thi Kim Truong and Nhan Trong Nguyen
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Da Van Huynh: School of Social Sciences and Humanities, Can Tho University, Can Tho 900000, Vietnam
Long Hai Duong: Department of Global Hospitality and Tourism, Kyung Hee University, Seoul 02447, Korea
Thuy Thi Kim Truong: School of Social Sciences and Humanities, Can Tho University, Can Tho 900000, Vietnam
Nhan Trong Nguyen: School of Social Sciences and Humanities, Can Tho University, Can Tho 900000, Vietnam

Sustainability, 2022, vol. 14, issue 6, 1-18

Abstract: Despite the stagnant status of the tourism industry due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the efforts to reopen the tourism destinations as green zones in Vietnam have paid off with some encouraging achievements. This inspires other green zones to consider a more adaptive approach to the ongoing pandemic crisis. However, little is known about the pandemic crisis management and tourism destination recovery. Therefore, this study selected Can Tho city as a case study to explore how a tourism destination as a green zone can recover during pandemic waves. Different methods were utilized in this study, including document analysis, field observation, and semi-structured interview. The findings generally indicate that a green zone could recover their tourism business under the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. The findings highlight the critical relationship among key stakeholders and the leading role of the central government toward pandemic prevention and control. The early response to the crisis from the local governments was found to be decisive, and the policy-related measures facilitated the removal of potential barriers and alleviated the crisis consequences. In addition, the involvement of the tourism industry in an adaptive way has contributed to the quick recovery of the green zones’ tourism business. Importantly, the adaptive transformation from the tourism enterprises in a visionary way was found to be essential to the empowerment of their organizational resilience during the pandemic crisis. The lessons learnt from this study also bring valuable experiences for other tourism destinations and elicit a new approach to co-living with the ongoing pandemic in a sustainable way. Theoretically, this study provides a better understanding of tourism management and destination recovery during the global pandemic crisis. In addition, the research also adds many important practical implications for the tourism industry and the related stakeholders to foster tourism revitalization during and after the pandemic in a more sustainable way.

Keywords: COVID-19; green zones; tourism response; recovery (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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