Ha Long Bay Visitors Are Willing to Pay $4 More — A 245-Tourist Valuation Study

In 2024, a research team conducted a 245-tourist contingent valuation survey at Ha Long Bay, asking visitors directly: would you pay more for entrance if the money went to environmental protection? The results, published on ResearchGate in December 2025, are unusually clean for environmental-economics research and give Quang Ninh province a credible mandate to act.

The headlines: 88.2% support an Environmental Protection Fund. 68.6% would pay higher entrance fees. The average tourist would pay an additional $4 per trip. This article unpacks the methodology, the implications for policy, and what it means for travellers planning Ha Long Bay visits in 2026 and beyond.

What the study did

Method

• Sample: 245 tourists surveyed during April–June 2024 fieldwork.
• Technique: Contingent Valuation Method (CVM) — a standard environmental-economics tool that asks survey respondents directly what they would pay for a non-market good.
• Format: Open-ended willingness-to-pay (WTP) elicitation, paired with perception assessments across five environmental impact categories.
• Five environmental domains assessed: solid waste, water pollution, air quality, biodiversity loss, and landscape degradation.
• Statistical approach: OLS regression to identify predictors of willingness to pay.

Headline findings

The 20-point gap between general fund support (88.2%) and personal willingness to pay (68.6%) is normal in CVM research — people often support principles more readily than fund them out-of-pocket. The 68.6% figure is the more useful policy number.

Predictors of willingness to pay

The regression model identified five significant predictors:

Biodiversity awareness was the single strongest predictor — visitors who explicitly thought about ecological consequences were the most willing to pay. Income and education matter, but only about as much as awareness alone.

Context

Ha Long Bay received over 17.1 million visitors between 2015 and 2019, growing at roughly 12% per year. Post-pandemic the volume has continued growing — 2025's 21.2 million national arrivals figure included substantial Ha Long visits. The CVM study is the first attempt we know of to quantify visitor willingness to pay specifically for environmental protection at the bay.

What this means for your trip

1. The case for a higher entrance fee is strong — expect it eventually

Current Ha Long Bay entrance fees are around 250,000–350,000 VND ($10–$14) for international visitors, depending on the cruise route and what's included. The CVM study suggests a 30–40% fee increase (taking the entrance fee to roughly $14–$18) would still see ~7 in 10 visitors comfortable paying it, provided the additional revenue is ring-fenced for environmental protection.

That's a cleaner mandate than most environmental-policy decisions get. If Quang Ninh province acts on the data — which is a political question, not just a policy one — expect modest fee increases through 2026 and 2027.

2. The 30–40% fee increase wouldn't materially change the trip cost

For a typical Ha Long Bay overnight cruise costing $200–$400 per person, a $4–$6 entrance-fee increase is rounding-error material. Day-trip visitors paying $50–$80 would feel it more (5–10% on the day cost), but still not enough to redirect significant demand.

The practical translation for travellers: don't book early hoping to lock in current fees. The fee differential isn't large enough to make hurried bookings worthwhile.

3. Operators that already invest in environmental protection are more resilient

If a higher entrance fee gets enacted with revenue earmarked for environmental protection, operators that have already invested in waste handling, biodiversity-friendly anchoring, and emissions reduction face less adjustment cost. Travelers booking in 2026 should:

• Ask operators about waste-handling practices (the Ha Long overtourism research summary covers what to look for).
• Consider whether their operator has signed onto any voluntary environmental-protection commitments.
• Prefer operators who already cite specific environmental investments in their marketing — they're not just better for the bay, they're better positioned for the regulatory direction the data points toward.

4. The domestic-international WTP gap is a useful signal

International CVM studies of natural heritage sites typically find international tourists willing to pay more than domestic ones — international visitors expect higher fees as a normal part of trip costs, while domestic visitors push back against being charged for "their own" heritage.

Ha Long Bay reverses this pattern. Vietnamese domestic tourists are more willing to pay than international visitors. The simplest explanation: Vietnamese visitors are emotionally invested in Ha Long as national heritage, while international visitors may treat it as one stop in a multi-country trip. The implication: Vietnamese tourism authorities have political room to raise fees that they might not have at other natural-heritage sites globally.

5. The study reinforces what to do as a responsible visitor

The biodiversity-awareness predictor (the strongest in the regression) confirms a pattern in environmental psychology research: people who think about ecological consequences specifically — not just "the environment" generally — pay more attention and care more. Practical implications for visitors:

• Ask about marine life in the bay before going (coral, fish populations, the small marine mammals occasionally sighted).
• Visit caves and floating villages with operators who narrate the ecology of what you're seeing, not just the photogenic beauty.
• Choose snorkelling or kayaking operators (where they exist on Lan Ha Bay) who emphasise reef-friendly practices.

The point isn't to optimise for the survey — it's that visitors who engage with the ecology of a place tend to enjoy it more, support its protection more, and behave better while there.

Limitations & caveats

• Stated WTP often overstates actual WTP. This is the canonical limitation of CVM research. Respondents who say they'd pay $4 more might or might not actually pay it when the fee changes. Best-practice CVM studies include "cheap talk" scripts and follow-up validation; the abstract for this study doesn't detail those, so treat the numbers as upper-bound preferences.
• The 245-tourist sample is modest for a CVM study. Larger samples (500–1,000+) would tighten the confidence intervals on the WTP estimates. The directional findings are robust, but specific dollar figures should be read with ±20% confidence intervals.
• The April–June 2024 fieldwork was during the high season. Tourists who travel during peak season may have different WTP profiles than off-season visitors (more income elasticity, different demographics). A balanced-season sample would strengthen the findings.
• The study is published on ResearchGate, not yet in a top-tier indexed journal. It's a credible research output, but doesn't carry the same review weight as a published Tourism Management or Journal of Travel Research article.
• The study doesn't tell you whether the fee increase will actually happen. Policy adoption is a political process — research provides the evidence base but doesn't dictate action.

Sources & further reading

• Primary source: Economic Valuation of Tourism's Environmental Impacts at Ha Long Bay: Implications for Entrance Fee Policy and Sustainable Tourism Management (ResearchGate) — December 2025.
• IUCN — Water pollution in Ha Long Bay: the challenge — international conservation perspective on the same problem.
• The Diplomat — Vietnam's Tourism Sector Set For Record Year in 2025 — broader context on the volume pressure the fee policy is responding to.

Related on this site:

• Ha Long Bay overtourism research — the framework-level companion study
• Ha Long Bay residents' perceptions — community-side data
• Ha Long Bay destination guide — practical operator and timing advice