2 hours ago, Is this real said:

I don't know where you are, Mitch, but, tourism has been declining in Phuket every year for the past 5 years.  Western tourism is off by at leat 50% from 2013 levels.  It wasn't talked about.  The big dropped was less obvious due to the Chinese increase.

Last year, the drop was blamed on the Baht and the tour ship sinking.  These really didn't impact things all that much.

This year, the virus actually is eliminating the tourism industry.

 

The real problem is how to resolve things if you don't admit there's a problem.

Western Europeans are down, sure, but Chinese and Russians have been up.

 

However I will say that I fully anticipated a reduction in numbers from mid-February and coronavirus have given the tourism authorities the best excuse possible.

8 hours ago, madmitch said:

Western Europeans are down, sure, but Chinese and Russians have been up.

 

However I will say that I fully anticipated a reduction in numbers from mid-February and coronavirus have given the tourism authorities the best excuse possible.

Russians may be up a little over last  year, but, down dramatically from 2014.  As expected, Chinese have stopped coming, but, their numbers had already been lower than 2018 and 2019.  Western tourism is off over 50% since 2014.  You can't just say it's down and brush this aside as if it doesn't matter.  This had been the bulk of Thailand's tourism and it went away.

4 hours ago, Is this real said:

Russians may be up a little over last  year, but, down dramatically from 2014.  As expected, Chinese have stopped coming, but, their numbers had already been lower than 2018 and 2019.  Western tourism is off over 50% since 2014.  You can't just say it's down and brush this aside as if it doesn't matter.  This had been the bulk of Thailand's tourism and it went away.

....And the government seems to be increasingly xenophobic, at least towards Westerners...

 

Something here isn’t adding up.  You can’t have it both ways, expecting high global tourism numbers but treating a large segment clearly as if they are not truly welcome. Not at all helped along by the health minister’s rant against Western tourists who choose not to wear a mask. 

Edited February 24, 20206 yr by Fore Man
Typo

Every country in the world ends up disliking, despising, detesting the tourists who flood in and ruin what there was to see that was worth seeing ... and the more tourists keep coming, the worse the locals' feelings towards them.

 

Hypocrisy? yes. Contradictory? yes. Universal human traits.

 

And the more expats there are residing in a country, the more difficult it is for the locals to distinguish between expats & tourists ...

On 2/21/2020 at 4:36 PM, MR1888 said:

Comparison with the Tsunami is a bit over the top when it’s an economic blip against what happened in 2004 
 

However, it doesn’t help when foreign companies grossly overreact 

 

I live in Phuket but work offshore in the UK
 

Mobilisation restrictions now make it near impossible at the moment for me to come back to Thailand every month 

 

 

I just had the same message from my company in Aberdeen.

On 2/21/2020 at 7:31 AM, Assurancetourix said:

 

Ola! You ask them to do the twelve labors of Hercules ..
and without brown envelopes I bet!
You will push them to collective suicide .. 

Ah, the ubiqitous brown envelope comment. throw in a witty hub remark and your work for tonight is done.