Towards A Semantic Knowledge-based Question Answering System for Vietnamese Tourism

Travel and Tourism is an important economic activity in most countries around the world. Holding a large number of attractive tourist destinations that lie along the country, with a long history, and diverse and rich culture, Vietnam is an attractive travel place. The Government of Vietnam has set the tourism sector a goal to become a key economic sector in 2020 and encouraged the application of information technology in this field. However, the research and development of tourist information systems and E-Tourism in Vietnam are not mature enough.

Tourism departments, tourism agencies, amusement parks, resorts, and luxury hotels in Vietnam have actively built their websites and portals to promote their products and services. However, it takes tourists a lot of time and effort to collect and combine touristic information from different sources. Moreover, keyword-based searching is the only method for users to look for tourism information. A lot of irrelevant information is returned to users and they have to process it manually to get their desired information; users spend a lot of time and effort and still cannot get relevant information. There is a need to develop more effective cultural and historical tourism information services, in Vietnam, that can deliver information to travelers based on their interests and provide information on tourist attractions along several dimensions, like culture, festival, and history, dimensions that can be combined as wished.

The goal of this project is to contribute to the sustainable development of Vietnam's tourism sector. The project has two main missions: (i) to enable the development of an open ontology-based knowledge base of tourism in Vietnam and (ii) to explore the possibility of using semantic web technologies to develop a smart tourism question-answering system on top of that knowledge base. Thus the project promotes the culture, history, famous landscapes, and famous historical figures of Vietnam. The input resources to construct the knowledge base are mainly in but not limited to Vietnamese language.

The project aims for sustainable development in Vietnam's tourism sector and promotes
culture, history, famous landscapes and famous historical figures of Vietnam. It can partially
help Vietnam to achieve the following Sustainable Development Goals¹, which are adopted by
the United Nations in 2015.

• Goal 4.7 By 2030, ensure that all learners acquire the knowledge and skills needed to promote sustainable development, including, among others, through education for sustainable development and sustainable lifestyles, human rights, gender equality, promotion of a culture of peace and non-violence, global citizenship and appreciation of cultural diversity and of culture’s contribution to sustainable development
• Goal 8.1 Sustain per capita economic growth in accordance with national circumstances and, in particular, at least 7 per cent gross domestic product growth per annum in the least developed countries
• Goal 8.2 Achieve higher levels of economic productivity through diversification, technological upgrading and innovation, including through a focus on high-value added and labour-intensive sectors
• Goal 8.9 By 2030, devise and implement policies to promote sustainable tourism that creates jobs and promotes local culture and products
• Goal 11.4 Strengthen efforts to protect and safeguard the world’s cultural and natural heritage

¹ https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/sustainable-development-goals/