THE chairman of the Thailand’s Tourism Authority, Weerasak Kowsurat, said that the ‘Asian Tiger’ was “back to normal” and the incidents over the past few months had settled down “quickly, peacefully and happily”.
Speaking during the ATM 2009 Kowsurat said his government had instituted several tourism stimulus packages and incentive schemes, many of which were dedicated Middle East programmes, to spur both inbound guest numbers and help restore the country’s reputation. “The government has launched many initiatives which will provide an instant boost, for example we are exempting visa fees for tourists coming to Thailand until the end of this year; while for airlines and air businesses, landing and parking fees have been hugely reduced,” he said.
“We are also introducing 50 per cent entry fee reductions to a huge number of our attractions, including national parks, marine parks and many more. These initiatives are designed to get things up and running again in all our target source markets.”
Inbound tourists from the Middle East region continue to grow year on year; last year 464,486 GCC based travellers visited Thailand, up 8.85 per cent on the 426,721 who made the journey in 2007, itself an 11.34 per cent increase on 2006 numbers.
And with some 1,953,520 airline seats from GCC airports to Thailand available from March 2009 to February 2010 – a 34 per cent increase on 2008 load capacity – Kowsurat knows the Middle East could play a vital role in Thailand’s tourism recovery.
“Our number of inbound guests from the Middle East continues to grow, which is offsetting drops we are seeing in other areas; it is important we focus our efforts on areas where growth is forecasted,” he said.
Although the UAE remains Thailand’s largest inbound Middle East market, Kowsurat recognised other strong regional contributors and detailed his Authority’s efforts to make inroads elsewhere in the Gulf including in Qatar, Iran and Kuwait.
Kowsurat added Thai Airways’ forthcoming expansion, when further Bangkok flights from Abu Dhabi, Jeddah and Tehran will be added – in addition to June 1st’s inaugural Emirates Airline’s A380 Dubai flight to Bangkok – are increasing air links and the number of seats from the region to Thailand and further aiding the country’s recovery.