South Korea is stepping up its efforts to attract visitors from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) with a special program from November 20 to December 11.

The South Korean Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and the Korea Tourism Organization (KTO) will run the campaign ‘Korea Welcomes You! Asean Welcome Week 2019’ to celebrate 30 years since the establishment of the Asean-South Korea diplomatic relationship and Asean-Republic of Korea (RoK) Commemorative Summit 2019, which will take place in Busan on Nov. 25-26.

Booths with information in Vietnamese, English, Thai, Burmese, and Indonesian will be arranged at Incheon International Airport, Myeongdong Street (Seoul) and Haeundae Beach (Busan). At these booths, tourists from Asean will receive gifts and coupon books that offer discounts up to 20 percent for more than 50 major tourist attractions in Seoul, Gyeonggi, Busan, and Daegu.

Tourists can also enjoy virtual trips to famous destinations in South Korea through Virtual Reality (VR) technology and take photos with beautiful landscapes and architecture as backgrounds at Myeongdong Station.

The number of tourists from Asean in the first nine months of this year has increased by 10.7 percent compared with the same period last year, according to Kim Hyung-joon from KTO.

“South Korea expects to receive a large number of tourists who come to enjoy winter activities, we are targeting the Southeast Asian market,” he said. (VNS)