Vietnam’s tourism industry is booming, with a record number of international travellers having arrived in the country in the first quarter of 2017.

According to the latest data from the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism (VNAT), the three-month total of 3.21 million visitors for January-March 2017 marked a 29.0% increase compared to the first quarter of 2016.

This was driven by visitation from other Asian countries, most notably mainland China. Chinese arrivals surged 63.5% to 949,199 in Q1 2017, accounting for almost 30% of total visitors. South Korea (+29.2% to 527,464) was comfortably Vietnam’s second largest source market, followed by Japan (+4.8% to 201,590), USA (+9.1% to 179,661) and Russia (+61.3% to 175,456).

Arrivals to Vietnam by air, which is a key indicator of international tourist traffic, increased 32.5% to 2.63m – 82% of the total.

Last year, Vietnam welcomed a record total of 10.01m visitors, up 26.0% year-on-year. And if the currently rates of growth continue, the country could end 2017 with between 12.5m and 13m international arrivals.