Phong Nha-Kẻ Bàng (Vietnamese: Vườn quốc gia Phong Nha-Kẻ Bàng) is a national park and UNESCO World Heritage Site in the Bố Trạch and Minh Hóa districts of central Quảng Bình Province in the North Central Coast region of Vietnam, about 500 km south of Hanoi.

Even before this discovery, Phong Nha held several world cave records, including the longest river as well as the largest combined caverns and passageways.

[8] In the late 19th century, Léopold Michel Cadière, a French Roman Catholic priest, conducted an expedition to explore Phong Nha cave, where he discovered Champa scripts.

From 1990 on, there marked a turning point in discovering activities, from exploration to research, thus full documents for submission to UNESCO for World Natural Heritage nomination were made available.

The first exploration was conducted in 1990 by a group from the British Cave Research Association and Faculty for Geology and Geography of Hanoi University, led by Howard Limbert.

[1] Based on the results of these three explorations, more information about the caves and grottoes made available to the Vietnamese and local government for the protection, planning, and tourism development of this park.

[11][12] On June 1, 2006, the Ministry of Culture and Information of Vietnam issued a stamp collection of depicting various landscapes found in Phong Nha-Kẻ Bàng.

[9] Like North Central Coast in general, and Quảng Bình Province in particular, the climate in Phong Nha–Kẻ Bàng national park is tropically hot and humid.

There is also strong evidence that sulphurous solution and hydrothermal action have played an important role in shaping the broad-scale landscape and the caves, though this has not yet been properly assessed.

Non-karstic topographical area accounts for a low percentage, distributing mainly in outer circle of limestone in the north, northeast and southeast of this national park.

The most common tree species in this park are Hopea sp., Sumbaviopsis albicans, Garcinia fragraeoides, Burretionendron hsienmu, Chukrasia tabularis, Photinia aroboreum and Dysospyros saletti.

These trees are listed in group 2A (rare, precious and limited exploitation) of the official letter 3399/VPCP-NN dated 21 June 2002, an amendment to the Decree 48 by the Government of Vietnam.

Other endangered large mammals include the mainland serow (Capricornis sumatraensis), giant muntjac (Megamuntiacus vuquangensis) and possibly the saola (Pseudoryx nghetinhensis).

Other smaller mammals include Sunda pangolins (Manis javanica) and the recently discovered Annamite striped rabbit (Nesolagus timminsi), called locally "thỏ van".

An initiative survey conducted by Russian and Vietnamese scientists from Vietnam-Russia Tropical Centre (funded by WWF) recorded 259 butterfly species of 11 families.

Inside Phong Nha cave, many Champa style ceramics, earthware vases with lotus-shaped ruby-colored, slight pink mouth.

In 2003 this park was listed in UNESCO's world heritage sites for criteria viii "outstanding geological, geomorphical, and geographical values".

[citation needed] At the final conference of the National Council for Cultural Heritage held in Vietnam in 2007, scientists attending the meeting highly praised the scientific documentation of Phong Nha-Kẻ Bàng park.

[50] Quảng Bình Province has invested in upgrading the Phong Nha-Kẻ Bàng visitor site to turn it into one of Vietnam's major tourist destinations.

Phong Nha–Kẻ Bàng is part of a tourism promotion campaign, "Middle World Heritage Road", which includes the ancient capital of Huế, the Champa relics of Mỹ Sơn, the city of Hội An, Nhã nhạc and the Space of gong culture in the Central Highlands of Vietnam.

[56] In October 2014, Quang Binh province announced plans by Sun Group to build a cable car system linking caves in the park.

Opponents say that construction of the cable car system could damage the fragile caves, and once it is operational it would attract more visitors than the park can sustainably handle.

This project is sponsored by Zoologische Gesellschaft Frankfurt (Germany) in order to provide a sanctuary for 10 species of primates, including the Hatinh langur and the red-shanked douc.

They are mainly Kinh people and other minority groups of Chut and Van Kieu, many of them exploit forest products as part of their livelihoods.

While local authorities have taken no legal action, nevertheless, some civil servants and policemen are the owners of restaurants that serve wild animal meats hunted in this national park.

and go huế wood (Dalbergia rimosa) and oils from trees such as Cinnamomum balansea, rattan has cause an exhaustion of these plants in many areas of the park.

Blocks of land have been sold to local investors and inhabitants for building service utilities in a haphazard way, resulting in the formation of a slum at the entrance of the park.

[67][68] Quảng Bình's provincial government responded by declaring their intention to recruit internationally recognised planners to help draft tourism development plans for the adjacent areas.

The British Commission for International Development sponsored a fund for the WWF to protect the biodiversity in the park and in the adjacent Hin Namno Nature Reserve in Laos.

FFI received environmental funding from the British Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs to implement a campaign targeted at increasing awareness about biodiversity protection among tourists and locals.