Thailand rolled out the welcome mat earlier this week.
On Monday, a plane full of tourists from Shanghai were greeted by dancers, puppeteers and even the new Thai prime minister Srettha Thavisin when they landed in Bangkok.
They were the first Chinese tourists to arrive after Thailand temporarily waived visas for Chinese nationals.
In 2019, pre-Covid, Thailand welcomed roughly 40 million tourists, with the tourism industry contributing about 20 percent to GDP. About 11 million of those tourists – the largest portion – were from China.
In 2022, Thailand had roughly 11 million tourists in total.
Billed as a quick win for tourism numbers, the inclusion of China in the visa-free programme aims to make it easier to enter the country. The programme was also expanded to include Kazakhstan nationals – previously, tourists from both countries had to apply and pay for visas.
The scheme gained Cabinet approval on September 13 and was implemented on September 25. It is initially a temporary measure and will run until February 29, 2024.
The Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) expect at least five million Chinese tourists to visit by the end of 2023 and spend around 300 billion baht ($NZD13.9billion) in total.
But the lucrative Chinese tourist market is not the only one Thailand is eyeing up with a visa-free offer. India is also on the radar.
According to the Bangkok Post, PM Srettha said the government had yet to approve visa-free travel for Indian nationals due to problems around visa application procedures.
Alongside that, there would need to be an increase in the number of flights between Thailand and India. In addressing media last week, Srettha said there weren’t “many incoming flights from India yet due to internal politics”, a reference to policies that maintain capacity parity for carriers of both countries.
However, that may change in the coming months. Srettha has announced plans to visit India before the end of the year. High on his list of priorities is discussing ways to attract Indian tourists to Thailand.
– Asia Media Centre
