VietNamNet Bridge – The Phu Quoc Island District has become a magnet for tourism property developers in recent years, owing to its friendly policies aimed at transforming the island into a tourist paradise.

A road on Phu Quoc Island. The island has attracted large tourism investments in recent years.

Currently, many giants have entered the tourist property market and are stepping up their projects' progress to make them operational as early as possible, with the projections that the number of tourists coming to Phu Quoc Island in the southern province of Kien Giang would increase sharply.

Nguyen Thanh Tung, the deputy head of the Phu Quoc Island Management Board for Investment and Development, said the Island held great potential for investors and offered certain advantages that could help it develop into a high-end tourism paradise.

The facts that forest cover accounts for 62 per cent of the Island's area, and it has a 150-kilometre long coastline and beautiful beaches, only add to its appeal.

The number of tourists coming to Phu Quoc Island have increased by 12 per cent every year during the past seven years and reached more than 600,000 last year, while the current supply of rooms was falling short of the demand.

Tung said there was also a growing wave of investments headed into the island, given that the island's infrastructure system includes an international airport, a seaport and roads, which were being completed and upgraded.

He said that many investors had shown an interest in investing in the real-estate market of Phu Quoc Island, especially with investment incentives from the local authorities.

According to the Management Board for Investment and Development, there were currently more than 200 investment projects in progress on the island, which were mainly resorts, hotels and tourism property projects. Of these, 143 projects had been granted investment licences, with a total capital of VND144.19 trillion (US$6.8 billion), and 21 projects were already in operation, with 13 being under construction.

Those included projects by giant property developers, such as Vingroup, the BIM Group, the Sun Group, and the CEO Group.

The Phu Quoc Island was also recognized as a second-tier urban destination last year and since then land prices on the district island had surged sharply.

In a master development plan approved by the Prime Minister, the island would act as a special economic zone, a centre for high-quality eco-tourism, trade and luxury services and a high-tech area.

Still, it would be important for the district island to complete its infrastructure.

VNS