Nga Nam Floating Market is an attractive destination attracting tourists to visit, buy and sell. Located in the southwest of Soc Trang province, Nga Nam town, the waterway gateway to the two provinces of Bac Lieu and Ca Mau, at the same time as the intersection of the five river branches, is gradually becoming an attractive new destination. tourists. People in the southwestern region always advise, come here, do not forget to buy snakehead fish sauce, anabas fish sauce with the famous folk flavor: “Fish sauce with minced meat duck seeds / Thuong Sao flavor of Nga Nam”. Nga Nam town is 60 km far from Soc Trang city, 80 km from Can Tho city along National Highway 1A, the East borders on My Tu district and Thanh Tri district (Soc Trang province); the North borders Long My town and Long My district (Hau Giang province); the West borders Hong Dan district (Bac Lieu province); the South borders Phuoc Long district (Bac Lieu province). While the tourism and service industry brings many socio-economic changes to neighboring localities, Nga Nam is somewhat quieter. The natural landscape in Nga Nam is not really outstanding compared to many other localities in the Mekong Delta but still has the advantage of pure nature, not affected by commercial and industrial activities. . In addition, the locality also owns a variety of cultural resources of three ethnic groups: Kinh, Hoa and Khmer Nam Bo, with architectural works: pagodas, churches, temples, historic sites … forming groups of potential sightseeing and tourism. In addition, Nga Nam town owns a convenient waterway and road network that can connect rural residential areas with the central area, as well as with other provinces. Notably, this is the gateway for tourists to connect the tour to the western provinces: Bac Lieu, Ca Mau, Kien Giang, Hau Giang. With favorable natural conditions, in recent years, Nga Nam town has had significant changes in socio-economic development. The limited tourism service economy is also seeing positive changes. The World Bread Organization and Action on Poverty (AOP) in Vietnam, the Consultative Institute for Rural and Mountainous Socio-Economic Development (CISDOMA) have conducted research to assess the CBT potentials in Nga Nam aims to identify opportunities to build new business models to help local people increase their income, preserve traditional cultural values, protect the landscape and environment, and gradually adapt and limit climate change impacts. According to project experts, Nga Nam has great potential for developing community ecotourism. Firstly, Nga Nam floating market is the most potential tourist destination. The market has been around for a long time, located at the intersection of five rivers: north to Phung Hiep, east to Thanh Tri, south to Phuoc Long (Bac Lieu province), west to Long My town ( Hau Giang province), the remaining branches go to Vinh Quoi commune, Nga Nam town. The market starts to meet around 3am and is busiest at 5am to 6am, lessens around 8am and ends in the morning. The whole scene of the market is like a vivid, multi-colored picture from vegetables and fruits to the image of the gentle rustic bra in the middle of the river. The sound of the paddle splashing the water, the call to buy goods on the canoe, the interest shell, the five-leaf, three-leaf canoe up and down… creates a very joyous scene. Helping the easy transmission of information between sellers and buyers, “crooked” trees are an effective means of this type of floating market. The “koi” tree is made of old bamboo, about 5 m high, with a sharp beveled angle for plugging and pliers when it is parked, the top is punched with holes to skew the rope, hang goods. From a distance, looking at the “crooked” trees, customers can find out what kind of goods to buy. Currently, due to the increasingly perfect road traffic system, some traders have turned to the form of onshore markets. However, the floating market is still operating quite bustling, still retaining the characteristic spirit of the southwestern floating market, which is a Soc Trang tourist destination that cannot be ignored. About 5 km from the town center is Tan Long stork garden in Tan Binh hamlet, Long Binh commune. The stork garden owned by the family of Mr. Huynh Van Muoi was formed decades ago, covering an area of ​​about 1.5 hectares with thousands of storks gathered every afternoon. This is also the locality with six ranked monuments, of which two monuments are nationally ranked: Ba My Dong Temple (Vinh Quoi commune) and the Victory site of Nga Nam area (ward 1); four relics are ranked at provincial level: Thanh That Minh Tien (My Tay A Hamlet, My Quoi Commune); Thanh Tri District Party Committee Base Area – Nga Nam (My Quoi Commune); O Chum Pagoda (Vinh Quoi Commune) and Victory Fortress Nga Nam (Ward 1). O Chum Pagoda is a typical relic of the Khmer Southern people, has a large campus and the location is also very convenient to access by both river and road. Currently, with the support of the local government, the socialization movement and the abbot’s devotion, many work items, the temple’s space is built and renovated. The pagoda is also a place to preserve and keep two ngo boats, the symbolic means of Nga Nam town to compete in the famous boat racing festival in Soc Trang and the Mekong Delta provinces. Coming to Nga Nam, tourists can visit the raw material area and the production of custard-apple tea, visit the orchard, experience knitting water hyacinths, cycle along the canals through the hamlets. Vinh Quoi commune, My Quoi commune and along the Phung Hiep Quan Highway, the amateurs’ song … In recent years, domestic and foreign tourists love to join the local people to participate in experiential activities such as collecting fruits, fighting catching fish, slapping fish, gardening, making beef cake, bean flour cake, banana cake … Regarding accommodation establishments, there is currently a two-star hotel with the number of 30 rooms; 14 accommodation establishments with 157 rooms are eligible to serve tourists. A tourist boat terminal is being invested and is about to put into operation and use, a private tourism company is operating. However, according to the leader of the Soc Trang tourism industry, besides its advantages, Nga Nam town is facing many difficulties when implementing community tourism. In addition to the basic difficulty that the tourism management team is inexperienced, the awareness of the community’s tourism is almost absent. This is the cause of spontaneous development of tourism, ineffective or wasteful investment, and the quality cannot meet the needs of visitors without good control and guidance. Besides, the issue of environmental protection in the locality has not been focused, people are littering in the floating market area, attractions, and gardens. At the historical and cultural sites, there are not many guides who are knowledgeable about culture and history to guide visitors. The handicraft households work infrequently, unevenly distributed, it is necessary to have a mechanism and train the people to welcome and guide visitors to participate in the experience. In addition, it is necessary to synchronously invest, improve the quality of the system of passenger boats, train tourists’ safety skills, and have a support mechanism for private businesses to boldly invest in the field. tourist transportation such as river ships, electric cars, trailers … Community based tourism is a type that does not require too much investment, but for a difficult locality like Nga Nam, it is very necessary to take advantage of and take advantage of capital. Sources of capital can come from state agencies, non-governmental organizations, investors, travel agencies and the source of socialization in the population. However, as project developers say, the most important factor is still the people. In addition to essential tourism operations such as cleaning the environment of landscapes, houses, welcoming guests, cooking, guiding tours … it is necessary to promote cultural advantages, restore traditional dances, singing, music. In the residential community, forming core groups in the community, creating favorable conditions and encouraging families with members to participate in learning, training tourism management, actively promoting tourism according to new trends, appropriate to the rapidly developing technology context.

According to Soc Trang Newspaper, the name of Soc Trang province has been recorded in books such as Khâm Định Đại Nam Congress, Directory Nam Kỳ, or research books by Vuong Hong Sen, Son Nam, Le. Huong, Hua Hoanh … Accordingly, the name Soc Trang is translated into Khmer is “Srok Khleang”. In which, “Srok” means “land”, “realm”, “Khleang” is “warehouse”, “barn”, which contains a lot of gold and silver of the king. Srok Khleang means the king’s gold and silver storehouse. Under the reign of King Minh Mang, Soc Trang was renamed Nguyet Giang province. Soc Trang Province is located downstream of the Hau River, where the Hau River flows into the East Sea at two estuaries of Dinh An and Tran De. Soc Trang province covers an area of ​​more than 3,000 km2 and a population of more than 1.1 million people. The population and area are both sixth in the Mekong Delta region. Soc Trang province currently has 11 administrative units at district level, of which 2 towns are Vinh Chau and Nga Nam. The capital of this province is Soc Trang city. Soc Trang province is bordered by Hau Giang province in the North, Bac Lieu province in the southwest, the Northeast bordering Tra Vinh and Vinh Long, the East and Southeast bordering the East Sea. In Soc Trang there is a Khmer ethnic museum, located in the city of Soc Trang. This is one of Soc Trang tourist attractions that attracts tourists. Tan Long stork garden located in Long Binh commune, Nga Nam town is one of the largest bird sanctuaries in the West. This place has a rare species of heron, the number in the garden is only a few hundred. Coming to Tan Long stork garden, in addition to seeing many rare and precious birds and storks, visitors can also enjoy specialties such as pancakes, noodle soup. Doi Pagoda is located about 2 km from the center of Soc Trang city. This is an ancient temple with a unique architecture in Soc Trang, built 400 years ago, now retaining a lot of precious treasures. On February 12, 1999, the Ministry of Culture and Information (now the Ministry of Culture – Sports – Tourism) issued Decision No. 05/1999 / QD-BVHTT recognizing Doi Pagoda as a national artistic relic.