The stages of resuming international flights
On November 8, leaders of the Ministry of Transport (MoT) proposed the Government to consider the approval of the plan to resume regular international flights in 3 phrases.
Phase 1 is expected from the first quarter of 2022 to resume flights between Vietnam and China, Hong Kong, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia, Laos, Cambodia, France, Germany, Russia, UK, Australia. These are the countries/territories where the rate of people receiving full doses of the vaccine is higher than Vietnam. Passengers on flights from other markets must have document-based permission from authorized agencies.
Fully vaccinated or recovered passengers will spend seven days in toll Isolation facilities, while those who are not vaccinated will have to quarantine for 14 days.
Expected frequency is 4 flights per week for each country with a total number of passengers entering Vietnam about 12,000 people per week. Based on the opinions of the relevant localities on the possibility of arranging isolation and receiving passengers, the Ministry of Transport will direct the Civil Aviation Authority of Vietnam to carry out the work of granting flight permits as regulations.
In the second phase, from the second quarter of 2022, international passengers flying to Vietnam on regular flights who have vaccine passports will not be required to undergo concentrated quarantine. In this phase, each airline will be allowed to operate seven flights per leg per week.
Passengers who carry a “vaccine passport” will have to undertake only 3-7 days of home quarantine following the instruction of The Ministry of Health and those who have not had "vaccine passport" will undertake 14-day concentrated quarantine.
Phase 3 from the third quarter of 2022 will operate a regular international flight with a frequency according to the needs of airlines. In addition, the Ministry of Transport proposed to allow flights to bring citizens back home in the form of combos including air tickets, hotels, quarantine costs and flights to pick up international tourists to some localities( Kien Giang, Khanh Hoa, Quang Ninh, Da Nang, Quang Nam). The ministry also proposed the Prime Minister direct agencies to publish pandemic control applications to install and make electronic medical declarations to serve passengers entering and staying in Vietnam.
According to the ministry's proposal, the general requirement for passengers entering Vietnam is to have a negative PCR test within 72 hours before the flight, and make an electronic medical declaration upon arrival.
From the end of March 2020 until now, all international flights from Vietnam are allowed to carry passengers and goods and on the way to Vietnam are only allowed to carry goods. Passengers on entry must have written consent from the competent authorities and take medical isolation for 14 days or 7 days.
According to the Civil Aviation Authority of Vietnam, in the past two years, more than 274,000 people have entered the country via air. Airlines have organized more than 400 "rescue" flights to transport more than 110,000 citizens home quarantined at military facilities, and nearly 150 flights with more than 30,000 people in the form of full self-pay costs for isolation at the hotel, car pick-up, testing.
Currently, there are 19 foreign airlines and Vietnam Airlines are operating routes between Vietnam and 13 countries and territories with an average of more than 130 weekly flights each way. In the first nine months of 2021, there are about 7,500 international flights to and from Vietnam with 350,000 passengers, of which, there are 3,700 flights to Vietnam in the way, transporting 153,000 passengers, the average seat occupancy coefficient is 6.4%.
