1
RESEARCH PROJECT
(BMBR5103)
THE DETERMINANTS OF MICE TOURISM
DEVELOPMENT IN HO CHI MINH CITY
(How to grow the tourists in MICE tourism?) TUDENT’S FULL NAME : HUYNH THI DOAN THUY
STUDENT ID : CGSVN00014959
INTAKE : BMBR5103
LECTURER : DR NGUYEN PHAN

SEPTEMBER 2014 2

ABSTRACT……………………………………………………………………………… 6
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION ……………………………………………………….7
MICE TOURISM PURPOSE AND RESEARCH DIRECTION: ………………….….7
1.1 Research Objectives and the Scope of the Research:…………………………… …8
1.2 The scope: ………………………………………………………………………….… 8
1.3 Problem Questions: ……………………………………………………………….… 8
1.4 Limitation of the research: …………………………………………………….…… 8
1.5 Research significance: ……………………………………………………………… 9
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW…………………………………………….… 9
2.1 Research definition of MICE tourism: ………………………………………… … 9

5.2.1 Mismatch between supplying MICE services and customers satisfaction………….…….44
5.2.2 Mismatch in reality and expectation…………………………………….……… 44
5.3 The satisfaction analysis at 5 stars hotel: ………………………………… ………45
5.3.1 Age group from 21- 30: ………………………………………………… ……….45
5.3.2 Age group from 31- 40: ……………………………………………… ………….46
5.3.3 Age group over 40: …………………………………………………….………….47
5.4 Analysis of factors affecting customers satisfaction…………………….……… 47
5.4.1 Age group 21- 30………………………………………………………….……… 48
5.4.2 Age group 31- 40: ………………………………………………………………….49
5.4.3 Age group over 40: ……………………………………………………… ………50
5.5 The regression Analysis and assessment of the factors affecting satisfaction of
customers:…………………………………………………………………………………50
CHAPTER 6: SOLUTIONS…………………………………………………………… 55
HOW TO DEVELOP MICE TOURISM IN HO CHI MINH CITY?
6.1 Forecast of international visitors to Ho Chi Minh City in 2020: …………………55
6.2 Forecast of demand for hotels in 2015: ……………………………………… ……56
6.3 Specific objectives from 2020: ………………………………………………………57
6.4 THE SOLUTIONS TO DEVELOP MICE TOURISM IN HO CHI MINH 2020: .60
6.4.1 Solution 1: new product development…………………………………………… 62
6.4.2 Solution 2: Improve infrastructure serving MICE ……………………………….62
6.4.3 Solution 3: Strengthen promotion…………………………………………………64
6.5 The suggestion to relevant departments and offices: ………………………………65
6.6 For the People's Committee of HCMC, the provincial departments and agencies
concerned: …………………………………………………………………………………65
Chapter 7: CONCLUSION ………………………………………………………………66

Table 1_Tourism accommodation facilities in HCMC 2013
Table 2_Growth of international arrivals, businessmen to HCMC 2000 - 2009
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demand higher than domestic customers.

APPENDIX I: QUESTIONAIRE……………………………………………………………….72
APPENDIX II:……………………………………………………………………………………75
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APPENDIX III: THE INTERVIEW QUESTIONS……………………………………………77
APPENDIX IV: THE ANALYSIS AND EVALUATION OF SCALE TO MEASURE OF THE
PERCEPTION ABOUT THE COMPANY OF EMPLOYEE…… 78
APPENDIX V: THE ANALYSIS AND EVALUATION OF SCALE TO MEASURE OF THE
PERCEPTION ABOUT THE HOTEL FACILITIES……………… 80
APPENDIX VI: THE ANALYSIS AND EVALUATION OF SCALE TO MEASURE OF THE
PERCEPTION ABOUT THE HOTEL SERVICES……………………… 81
APPENDIX VII: THE ANALYSIS AND EVALUATION OF SCALE TO MEASURE THE
PERCEPTION ABOUT THE HUMAN RESOURCES 83

6

ABSTRACT
With the developing of economic and human resources, and realizing the importance of the
tourism industry, Ho Chi Minh City is striving to become a destination for tourists.
Understanding the nature advantages and the strengths of local, Ho Chi Minh City
determined spearhead development of the tourism sector to 2015 is the MICE tourism.
The purpose of this study was to determine the subject business situation, the advantages and
disadvantages of the services for MICE tourism in Ho Chi Minh City. Thereby, the author
gives some suggestions and offers some solutions to improve operational efficiency of the
business unit for Ho Chi Minh City in the near future, including:
1. To explore the academic literature related to the MICE industry development.
2. To analyze the opportunities and profits of MICE tourism market.
3. To research hotel business of MICE tourism in Ho Chi Minh City.

to the World Tourism Organization, in the future, as infrastructure development, the
Vietnamese will increasingly improve the quality and competitiveness of tourism,
particularly MICE tourism.
Ho Chi Minh City is no exception. With the continuous development of economic and human
resources, and perceived importance of the tourism industry, Ho Chi Minh City is striving to
become an ideal destination for tourists. Understand the advantages of natural and local
strengths, identify City spearheaded development of the tourism sector between now and
2015 is the MICE tourism. However, due to objective reality and initial development,
practice, Ho Chi Minh City has been largely exploited tourist meetings, seminars and
conferences should be within the scope of this article is solely secondary studies in tourism
and would like to travel for short conference.
Questionnaires and surveys:
In this topic, the questionnaire survey to investigate tourists (80% is the object MICE answer
to Ho Chi Minh City and 20% of the City organization MICE) travel preferences , spending
tourists, quality of service, quality of human resources the questionnaire was designed
mainly closed questions, not too hard, are arranged from easy to difficult, question contents
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make respondents said the most honest answer. Time to investigate the direct questionnaire
asked each person must not exceed 5 minutes.
Expert opinion:
To find solutions for tourism development conference for Ho Chi Minh City is an area not
simple, is related to socio-economic sectors. So during the planning and implementation of
promotion plans are required referendum reputable experts in the fields concerned, most
experts with experience in organized tourism conference or MICE.
1.1 Research Objectives and the Scope of the Research:
Main objective:
The purpose of this study was to determine the subject business situation, the
advantages and disadvantages of the services for MICE tourism in Ho Chi Minh City.
Thereby, the author gives some suggestions and offers some solutions to improve operational

This research could help Ho Chi Minh City can asses the opportunities and challenges of
MICE tourism.

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1 Research definition of MICE tourism:
The global tourism industry can be divided between leisure tourism and business
tourism. However, they both require the same infrastructures in terms of accommodations,
transports and communications, entertainment, information services and so on (Cooper et al.,
2008). The former refers to people whose travel is part of his employment, and as a
consequence essential and organized on a regular basis. As far as the latter is concerned, it is
a broad term used to define the business travel industry. Meetings, trade fairs and exhibitions,
incentive travel and corporate hospitality are one sector within business tourism. The MICE
tourism stands for Meetings, Incentives, Conferences and Exhibitions. IAPCO (the
International Association of Professional Congress Organizers) publishes a book called
"Meetings Industry Terminology" which functions as a dictionary for the meetings industry.
These are the definitions as put out by IAPCO:
Meeting - general term indicating the coming together of a number of people in one
place, to confer or carry out a particular activity. Frequency: can be on an ad hoc basis or
according to a set pattern, as for instance annual general meetings, committee meetings, etc.
Incentive - meeting event as part of a program which is offered to its participants to
reward a previous performance.
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Conference - participatory meeting designed for discussion, fact-finding, problem
solving and consultation. As compared with a congress, a conference is normally smaller in
scale and more select in character - features which tend to facilitate the exchange of
information. The term "conference" carries no special connotation as to frequency. Though
not inherently limited in time, conferences are usually of limited duration with specific
objectives.
Exhibition - Events at which products and services are displayed.

during the week from Monday to Thursday (Davidson and Cope, 2003).
As a result of these aforementioned benefits of the MICE industry over leisure
tourism, an increasing number of destinations are pursuing this lucrative market (López,
2008; Swarbrooke and Horner, 2007; Davidson, 2008). MICE related travel is one of the
fastest growing sectors of the global tourism industry (Campiranon and Arcodia, 2007). Due
to the increasing competition, having a unified MICE destination image is of prime necessity
(Chon and Weber, 2002).
All over the world, the acronym MICE encompassing for meetings, incentives,
conferences and exhibitions are widely used (Rogers, 2003). Notwithstanding with this all-
encompassing acronym people can understand that it is only one activity. The reality is far
more different because it encompasses four separate and distinct activities.
As a conclusion, as explained in this part the MICE industry is plagued by varying
definitions. Thus, the lack of an appropriate and standardized terminology all around the
world makes the comparison of data very difficult. For instance, some events would be
classified as a meeting in one company due to its size and in others it would be too small to
be considered as a meeting. Hence, this limitation will be carefully taken into account while
conducting this research.
2.3 Related Model in an analysis:
Besides the analysis of the MICE industry in terms of sectors presented above, it can
also be subdivided in terms of stakeholders (Swarbrooke and Horner, 2007).
Indeed, the MICE industry is characterized by its high complexity and high
fragmentation where lots of buyers, supplier organisations and businesses are involved
(Swarbrooke and Horner, 2007). Rutherford (1990 cited in McCabe et al., 2000) describes the
process of planning and developing an event like the design of a wheel. The event is the
centre of the wheel and the different spokes represent all the suppliers involved in a business
event and they act as intermediaries between the centre and the edge of the wheel, where the
participants are. All the components of the wheel are interdependent and must be coordinated
so as to have a successful event (Page, 2003).
In the Figure 1, the structure of business travel and tourism is represented and it also
shows that all the stakeholders are interdependent.

prospect of the travel company.
Statistics from the World Tourism Organization showed that the values obtained from
the MICE market worldwide is about 300 billion dollars annually and its relationship with
other economic sectors generate value close 5490 billion, accounting for over 10% of world
GDP. There are many countries understand and grasp the opportunities of MICE as America,
France, Germany, Spain, Austria or separate Asia Hong Kong, Thailand, China Hong
Kong Convention Centre restaurant year attracting over 4.5 million visitors attended MICE
events. Thailand is currently the world's major destinations for MICE, the estimated annual
MICE accounts for about 15% of the total number of international tourists to travel to
Thailand. In Vietnam, the tourism and business in the new aviation since 2002, according to
information from Saigontourist, at the international conference on recent MICE, Ho Chi
Minh City and Hanoi are the business MICE is evaluating two potential new destinations.
MICE clients have grown tired of the old familiar places in Asia, such as Bangkok, Bali,
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Manila, Kuala Lumpur plus the fear of terrorism, to Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City if timely
motion, can grasp this opportunity.
MICE Tourism brings
2.4.1 What are the benefits?
So far, there are also various types of tourism products combine nature, such as
combined medical tourism, tourism combines religious study culture, tourist resorts But
the kind of this single human nature, not a focus on developing strong due to the amount
requested, much less than the volume of customers served once great yet. Particularly MICE
tourism has been the organizer of the tour of the world special interest because it provides a
huge source of profit, and create a lot of jobs and create a cultural exchange to keep the
national
According to survey data of associations, conferences world (ICCA) is:
-Average expenditure in international meetings and 343 USD / day / person.
- Average spending in a year of international meetings, large companies in the world is $ 3
billion.

in the Asean region.
 Market:
Domestic MICE: MICE need not be held overseas. Domestic MICE market will be
that where the request originated from the company, based in the region (limited by the scope
of water) takes place MICE and implementation from the form and nature of the event, as
well as payment of the whole event is the company, which is based in the country.
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Participants in this event are mostly local people. This category also saving costs for both
organizations to help develop domestic tourism.
MICE international MICE market comes as international companies based in foreign
countries, all the requirements and decide on the form of service, quality and price, payments
are made by the public foreign company and make decisions. Majority of the audience are
foreigners. However, based on the above criteria to divide this market currently no longer
accurate. In fact, it is sometimes difficult to distinguish between these two markets where the
trend of globalization, multinational corporations have branches in many countries around the
world. Maybe MICE contract is a foreign company, but the object is directly serving
customers in water. For example: the LG Group of South Korea if the workshop in Korea
where the participants are subsidiaries of LG Electronics will have the group Korea, Vietnam,
China the more it creates for this type of rich colors.
2.4.2.2 Objects MICE tourists:
 On the number:
MICE tourists usually agencies, corporations, associations or organizations. The
conference and exhibition are often gathered large numbers in a certain area, maybe from
around the world, such as date of 18/9, Travel Expo 2009 world tour opened in the capital
Japan's Tokyo with the participation of the travel agency, tour operators, hotels and airlines
from some 150 countries and territories around the world, has attracted countless tourists
choose this place is the gathering place for. So, should you sign a contract as well as MICE
then signed hundreds of other single contract.
Moreover, the tourists in the same union with a common purpose, and common use of


- Ease of access: the location (city) organizes conferences and seminars to be close to
the international airport, many flights to other countries in the world.
- Professionalism: meetings, conferences and seminars must be guaranteed in terms of
professionalism held at the time of registration, check-in time, material, opening ceremony,
introduction, light , sounds, cuisine, closing ceremony.
- Equipment: Where should the conference be brightly decorated, comfortable and
fully equipped with projector, microphone, interpreting, video cameras, background music,
the secretary
- Hotel: The hotel was chosen as close as possible meeting locations. In addition,
guests subjects attended by entrepreneurs, high-level visitors so the 3 to 5 star hotels,
rooms quality is always the first choice.
- Level of confidence: it is important for the organizers of the conference venue
selection. Therefore, the favorable policies to promote, improve the environment for
international travel from macro management of the new government can guarantee this.
- Diversity: Conference host countries have beautiful landscapes, diverse culture and
unique, many amusement parks, commercial centers.
2.5 OVERVIEW OF HO CHI MINH CITY
As a center of economic and cultural-scientific and technological hub with the
transportation system as an important international airport of Tan Son Nhat, Saigon Port ,
industrial parks located in the city perimeter, natural resource diversity, abundance and
spread out over many different terrains, many tourist attractions; the Ho Chi Minh City is
quite sensitive, open-minded, enthusiastic, fast adaptation to integration; Ho Chi Minh City
has great potential in the approach, exploiting and developing MICE tourism (focus on
tourism conference) - a tendency to travel the world.
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As a young city with 300 years of history, but Ho Chi Minh City has built many buildings
and owns a diverse culture. The tourist attraction of the city is relatively diverse. With 11
museums system, mainly on historical themes, Ho Chi Minh City Vietnam ranked first in the

• Culinary Tourism services:
Ho Chi Minh City, where good land birds, the land of all ethnic groups in all regions
of the country, so that luck crystallization characteristics of the 3 North, Central, South, turn
List the city and cultural center of the country's cuisine. Currently, the 3-5 star hotels have
on-site catering with high-level menu, varied and plentiful at the request of the customer, and
satisfies part needs to learn the culinary culture of guests. Standardized system restaurants,
luxury development is very strong. You can list some typical address is generally chosen to
entertain tourists as senior Ngoc Suong seafood restaurant, Indochina, Vietnam Phan,
Delicious and some quality restaurants serving specialties pure Vietnam like pancakes
Eating is addicted, Pho 24 In addition, visitors also have the opportunity to entertain in the
culinary program characterized by the Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism, Ho Chi
Minh City in conjunction with a number of units held annually such as gastronomic
delicacies Festival of water, Southern Fruit Festival
• Services in amusement, recreation, visit:
In recent years, the city has gradually established a system amusement parks superior
luxury and high-income earners such as golf courses, high-end business center, high-quality
cinema partially meet the needs of the MICE.
• procurement of goods and services, souvenirs:
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Subjects MICE tourists luxury, spending levels are much higher than the general
public, expenditures for their shopping is not small. So, if you know how to market this
object will bring enormous source of foreign currency for the city.
Ho Chi Minh City has a system of shopping centers, supermarkets. Ben Thanh Market
icon on the exchange of trade from the ancient city, remains today an important role. The
recent decades, many modern commercial center appears as Parkson, Diamond Plaza
Consumption of Ho Chi Minh City is much higher than other provinces of Vietnam and 1.5
times higher Hanoi.
• The development of tourist accommodation establishments:
The development of tourist accommodation establishments to 2010:

4.587
4
16
2.298
3
68
5.122
2
204
6.815
1
1.009
16.691
1 – 5 Stars
1.311
35.513
Standard hotels
563
7.520
Luxury apartments
1
240 aparts
5 star hospital
1
150 aparts
Total
1.876
43.423
(Source: Hotel management Division- Department of Cultures, Sports and Tourism HCMC)
In terms of quality, CSLTDL system of the city has witnessed rapid development.

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sometimes focus on Construction of the new items that are less focused cultivate those old
items that the overall park becomes cluttered, aesthetic
• Procurement of goods and services, souvenirs:
Almost everywhere in the city, tourists can find yourself a favorite item. But the
important thing here is to create the impression of goods for tourists. Requirements of MICE
tourists usually very high and subtle, but present, souvenir products in Ho Chi Minh City has
something special rare sexism Saigon Ho Chi Minh City, the majority only new focal
collection of souvenir shops, traditional handicrafts from different regions only.
• The development of tourist accommodation establishments:
Besides the positive side, the system of city CSLTDL also limited, as indicated in the
following major aspects:
 First, the financial crisis - banking on a global scale since late 2008 and Influenza A
/ H1N1 since mid-2009 has been affect business travel - Vietnam hotel general and HCM
City in particular, make use of block occupancy 3-5 star hotels was estimated to reach 58%
(down 10.3% compared to 2008).
 Second, the hotel 3-5 star accounts for the low rate of only 65 hotels with 8,980
rooms accounted for 23.8% of the total number of rooms. The rest are mostly small hotels,
small rooms, little service, design, decorative yet professional, the rate of trained laborers
hotel operations and low use of foreign languages, so that service quality not high, does not
meet the requirements of international delegations, tourists traders, there is the group
solvency but require high quality and professional service style high.
Status of international visitors to Ho Chi Minh City:
Ho Chi Minh City attracted the largest number of tourists Vietnam. By 2009, although
affected by the economic crisis in 2008 caused tourists to the city has decreased, but their
own international visitors to Ho Chi Minh City still accounts for 66.40% of the whole
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country. In the meantime, for business purposes (business travelers) increased by 92.9%

khách thương
nhân
1
2
3
4
5
6=2/5
2000
1.100.000
220.000

2.140.100
419.600
52,43
2001
1.226.400
245.280
111,50
2.330.800
401.100
61,15
2002
1.433.000
286.600
116,80
2.628.200
445.900
64,27
2003

114,90
4.171.564
643.611
60,05
2008
2.800.000
560.000
103,70
4.253.740
844.777
66,29
2009
2.600.000
520.000
92,90
3.772.359
783.139
66,40
60,69%
(1)Source: Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism HCMC