Protests scare away almost 2 million tourists… :-/ BANGKOK: The ongoing protests and state of emergency in Bangkok have scared away two million tourists and inflicted a loss of 82 billion baht to the tourism industry. The figure was revealed at the meeting between the Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) and the private sector to find ways to promote tourism during the current political unrest. TAT governor Thawatchai Aranyik informed the meeting that TAT has not lowered its targeted number of tourist arrivals for the year from 28 million, nor would it decrease its targeted tourism income from 2.2 trillion baht, despite the ongoing political instability. He said the TAT would work out measures to promote tourist arrivals amid the current political instability. But the private sector has voiced concern that the protests have caused the country to lose 1.8 million tourists in the first quarter of the year, and to lose an income of about 82 billion baht. It then calls on the government to lift the emergency decree as soon as possible, stating it would be best if it could do so within the end of February. Meanwhile, Thai Hotels Association chairman Surapong Techaruvijit I said that hotel and lodging reservations outside of Bangkok are still growing well. He said Koh Samui, Phuket, and Chiang Mai are seeing an 85% hotel room booking, with Chinese tourists being the main customers in those places. He noted, however, that hotel reservation in Bangkok has declined by 20 percent, while hotels and lodgings in protesting sites are only 25-30% reserved. Yet, hotels in those areas ensured that they would not lay off their employees and would decrease spending in other sector instead. At the same time the University of the Thai Chamber of Commerce revealed that 30.5% of the country’s SMEs have been severely affected by the continuing political demonstrations, while 22 % said they were moderately affected. If the current situation continued, the SMEs would only be able to carry on with their businesses for 4.6 months. Moreover, most are speculating that other risk factors could dampen economic growth to less than 2% for the year.
Posted on: Fri, 07 Feb 2014 04:25:32 +0000
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