Experts pinpoint Thai tourism setbacks

[Asiantravel]

I actually think the tourists are down by about 50% in real terms.

I flew to the UK last month and back to Thailand, The plane was completely full both times. Would that suggest that tourism is down by 50%?

huh ?

How can you possibly know what was the final destination of the majority of passengers on your plane ? A number of them could have been changing planes to go on to the neighbouring countries and others might have been going on to New Zealand and Australia

[NoshowJones]

I actually think the tourists are down by about 50% in real terms.

I flew to the UK last month and back to Thailand, The plane was completely full both times. Would that suggest that tourism is down by 50%?

huh ?

How can you possibly know what was the final destination of the majority of passengers on your plane ? A number of them could have been changing planes to go on to the neighbouring countries and others might have been going on to New Zealand and Australia

Yes that's true, the first time I came to Thailand, the baht was about 65 to the pound, and on the way back I had the three window seats to myself, about three years after that, I flew to Thailand and again I had the three window seats to myself, why is that not happening now with Thailand supposed to be 50% down on tourism?

Would you not expect to see plenty of empty seats on the planes at the moment?

[NoshowJones]

I actually think the tourists are down by about 50% in real terms.

I flew to the UK last month and back to Thailand, The plane was completely full both times. Would that suggest that tourism is down by 50%?

huh ?

How can you possibly know what was the final destination of the majority of passengers on your plane ? A number of them could have been changing planes to go on to the neighbouring countries and others might have been going on to New Zealand and Australia

[Fab5BKK]

I don't pretend to be an expert but noticed that Cathay Pacific did reduce the number of flights they operate between Hong Kong and Bangkok due to the lack of demand.

Just my 2 cents

55555!! No wonder I've never heard of that airline - neither has anyone else which is why they cancelled flights!!!

[madpat]

The problem is that they are like the ostrich ,,,burying their heads in the sand to the real problems, do they think possible visitors to Thailand give a toss about statistics,do they think they cars about officials giving wrong numbers ?

The problem is that they never once during the unrest in Bangkok advertised or sent out information saying it was a localised problem and if you didnt stick your nose in all would be ok.

I also do not see any/much advertising on Western media showing the beauty of Thailand and how it is possible to get away and have a great time.

As for the Thais not liking foreigners can you blame them, their beaches are ruined their land is taken over to build huge condos and hotels and a lot of foreigners treat Thais like second class citizens, especially those in the service industries.

I lived in Spain for 5 years and saw the same huge investment in development, huge apartment blocks, hotels etc, a lot of it helped through planning by corrupt officials in local government, 1000's of acres of olive trees just happened to catch fire and get destroyed then the land was only good for development, now look at Spain absolutely swamped with unsellable apartments and villas.The Spanish hate most other Europeans because of the way their country has been spoilt for "bloody tourists"

As for the Russians they loved Spain for "investing" for quite a few years but then started moving to Thailand where the "investments" are plain to see.soon it will be another destination that is as cheap as Thailand once was.

[tomacht8]

what effects tourism ?

First the article in the OP is complete nonsense and is a fine example of people in Thailand that don't have a clue thinking they do, tourists have absolutely no interest in what figures Thailand published about numbers - here is what matters

- Safety

- Value for money

- exchange rate

- double pricing

- greed

- over pricing

- Infrastructure

- cleanliness

- environment

- corruption

- Mafia in tourist areas abusing tourists - scams

The short term decline could probably be mostly attributed to the state of finances in other countries.

Any long term decline trend is attributable to the list above

As I have said many times before the Thai people have been making large sums from tourism for years but instead of using 10 - 20 - 30% of that and putting it back in to improve all of the above they can't get it into their pockets fast enough - pure greed without forward thinking

Private sector has been building world class hotels and other accommodation but unfortunately once you step out into the city you are met with stench pollution filth danger corruption scams and abuse which they have done nothing to improve for years

They need to get their heads out of their greedy asses and see it for what it is

Paying the same price for a bottle of beer in tourist areas as people do back home is quite simply ridiculous - they have priced themselves out of business, a fine example would be waking street in Pattaya - price fixing exists and if you step out of the box you will be removed - a beer is 35baht in a 7/11 it should never be anywhere near 280baht no matter where your business operates

That sums up the whole very good.

Thailand was an exotic holiday destination with all its natural palm-fringed beaches.

With the beautiful wide-set romantic beach huts.

Calm, relaxing, with nice locals, healthy food and at good prices.

Today:

At the beach, the palm trees are gone.

Everywhere are now long rows of town houses made of concrete.

The beaches are dirty, it stinks of garbage in the heat.

It is loud, the locals are often rude and the food is bland.

The prices are high for normal earners.

The beaches are more and more dominated by the hotel chains.

Many resorts are walled with 2 meter high concrete walls.

The range of luxury accommodation is rising, but is not enough demand.

It lacks a reasonable target group analysis and in a long-term development planning.

[Joey J]

Yes tourism numbers are down, but tourism is down all over the world. People's travel habits are changing, especially with so many people in countries where money has been hard to get. Sorry but have to say this but it's going to get worse. Welcome to big business running everything.

[Joey J]

And the working classes working for nothing.

[Joey J]

And I'm sort of right wing. What a mess.

[Joey J]

Bang on well said.

[PaPiPuPePo]

I also do not see any/much advertising on Western media showing the beauty of Thailand and how it is possible to get away and have a great time.

As for the Thais not liking foreigners can you blame them, their beaches are ruined their land is taken over to build huge condos and hotels and a lot of foreigners treat Thais like second class citizens, especially those in the service industries.

As to your first point, I hope they don't, there are already to many foreigners in Thailand :-).

And thanks for pointing out the second thing. I've read a number of comments on this thread and wondered how the writers can have such a blind spot, saying the Thais' animosity towards tourists and foreigners in general is due to the fall off of tourist dollars. In fact, a fair amount of our behaviour is either unacceptable but forgiven, or beyond letting go so resented. Some of the frowned-on behaviour is done by Thai (men) too but where is there no double standard and no racism?

This is true of long-timers, all the more so for tourists. It wouldn't hurt for TAT to make some effort to educate tourists on arrival with some do's and don'ts. Why not?

[PaPiPuPePo]

Thailand was an exotic holiday destination with all its natural palm-fringed beaches.

With the beautiful wide-set romantic beach huts.

Calm, relaxing, with nice locals, healthy food and at good prices.

Today:

At the beach, the palm trees are gone.

Everywhere are now long rows of town houses made of concrete.

The beaches are dirty, it stinks of garbage in the heat.

It is loud, the locals are often rude and the food is bland.

The prices are high for normal earners.

The first describes Samui in 1987 pretty well. The second, Samui in 2014 when I returned just to see what had happened. Shock and disgust, frankly.

Sure every place changes and many are changing for the worse in terms of nature and environs, but I think Thailand has become 10x more expensive since then but the positive changes since then aren't anything like 10x better, and IMO are negated by the horrible "development" of many beautiful areas and the islands and other problems that have gotten worse or just festered.

I still like it here, maybe tourism will drop back to a consistent <10M and the place will improve once the dust settles.

[northernjohn]

Inaccurate data yes. TAT announcements often are hilarious only. But there's no mention of the frequent scams. Jetski operators, taxi drivers, gems sellers, beach chair morons, police looking for tee money and others. Those bad guys are small in numbers really, but they have an increasingly impact on the image of the land of smiles.

The many "suicides" by falling from balconies and the recent horrible murder of the two brittish youngsters on Koh Tao will cost the kingdom plenty in the longer run.

A huge and lasting cleanup is needed to revive tourism. If that is possible remains to be seen.

I agree

Those bad guys are small in numbers really

But it seems like they are about the only thing some people can see in Thailand. Here in Chiang Mai we have no problem with jet ski scams or beach chair morons. We also have very little problems with the taxi scams. Some will over charge 20 baht and you can always walk away from them. There will be another one along at a better price.

Yet to hear of any gem scams here.

Let us say that the numbers are inflated. Would you as a foreign citizen considering a holiday in another country look up the number of tourists to make your decision by. Or would you have an objective in mind no matter the number of tourists.

Possibly the members who have been in the business for years could look at the service they offer. Is it polite? is it prompt? Is there premises kept clean? Are their rooms kept in good condition? If they are orientated to people who want to use the beach do they offer free advice as to the best places to go and for the best honest service?

Answer no they point the finger at the government for all their problems. Admittedly the government could do more to clean up the scams but as you say it is not that many cases of it. Also any experienced traveler knows when he travels to a country like Thailand Mexico and many other tourist centers in the world their are going to be scams in the tourist areas.

One other thing that has hurt ?Thailand and is slowly changing is the perception that having martial law means that they have no freedom. The foreign media is really playing that up while we who live here know it is false. Most of us if not reminded of it by some anti junta forget about it and walk the streets feeling safer than we did before it came into affect.

[halloween]

55555!! No wonder I've never heard of that airline - neither has anyone else which is why they cancelled flights!!!

They were only flying around Indonesia for 52 years. That's why I told you to google, to help you overcome you obvious ignorance.

[eeworldwide]

Ooook!!!!!

My ignorance is truly staggering

[Thai at Heart]

I actually think the tourists are down by about 50% in real terms.

I flew to the UK last month and back to Thailand, The plane was completely full both times. Would that suggest that tourism is down by 50%?

huh ?

How can you possibly know what was the final destination of the majority of passengers on your plane ? A number of them could have been changing planes to go on to the neighbouring countries and others might have been going on to New Zealand and Australia

Yes that's true, the first time I came to Thailand, the baht was about 65 to the pound, and on the way back I had the three window seats to myself, about three years after that, I flew to Thailand and again I had the three window seats to myself, why is that not happening now with Thailand supposed to be 50% down on tourism?

Would you not expect to see plenty of empty seats on the planes at the moment?

How do you know they are running the same capacity in these routes as they were at any time in the past?

[Jonmarleesco]

'... data and statistics provided by official bodies is inaccurate ...' It needed experts to work that one out?

[MZurf]

And here are the new visa rules:

http://notthenation.com/2014/05/new-visa-rules-restrict-entry-to-sex-tourists-alcoholics-drug-addicts-ravers-illiterate-troglodytes/

[3NUMBAS]

when stickman decides to up sticks it gets reported around the globe

[GAZZPA]

Some years back, an English girl was raped and murdered on Lamai Beach on New Years Eve. It made for big news in the UK.

2 days later, an english friend got a call from his mother - isn't that where you live, it looks absolutely beautiful. He said "yeah, if you don't mind being raped and murdered" to which his mother replied "I could be raped and murdered in my own home." (as related to me).

Millions of people who had never heard of koh Tao will now know of it and its attractions. Once the crime is solved and the hullaballoo dies down, tourism will actually increase IMHO.

'There's no such thing as bad publicity.' P T Barnum

Rubbish,, if a place is known for being unsafe and full of violent crime people don't go there, simple as that. The only time what you say may be true is if the place is constantly publicised and the good publicity outweighs the bad.

In this case, it is all bad so people will avoid.

[pedrinho]

there are other, at least equally important, reasons why thai tourism is suffering.

i will cite only two : 1) competition. the emergence of other s.e. asian destinations that offer a similar product are giving thailand a run for its money (Vietnam is a good example), with less fuss, fewer scams and lower prices; and there's always Bali, which is an alternative when thailand gets bad press (as it often has in recent years);

2) confusing image and campaigns: it is difficult to aim, as TAT wishes, at BOTH the 'high end' tourist and be seen as a 'family-friendly destination', for those who expect high end products and services (which thailand does possess) AND at the same time be widely seen as a 'down market' destination for cheap package tours that thrive on single male tourists and 'party animals' (pattaya comes to mind).

[daveAustin]

People are wising up, listening to their friends that have already endured all the baggage. The internet has made everything open, there's no hiding behind glossy brochures. The tourism figures have always been skewed, with REAL numbers for the year closer to 10-15M.

TAT, listen up: your beaches and hotels may be nice, the sun always shines and prices are marginally less, but folks are seeing through the default smiles and are voting with their feet. People have had enough of the BS just to holiday here... you need another holiday in Spain just to get over this one. But just think yourselves lucky; if the Burmese hadn't been scuppered by their army, they would seriously be open for business right now and you would be flattered by 2M tourists.

[paddyjenkins]

I actually think the tourists are down by about 50% in real terms.

I flew to the UK last month and back to Thailand, The plane was completely full both times. Would that suggest that tourism is down by 50%?

It just might. If plane occupancy goes down from 100% to 50%, and say 2 out of 4 flights are cut because of that, then the remaining flight you are on would still be full. But don't let deeper analysis, helicopter views and mathematics get in the way of your oversimplified view on the world.

I am not saying it has not happened, but I have never read of any flights to Thailand being cancelled because they are not full.

Moot point dear fellow. I've never heard of ANY flight being cancelled because it's not full.

Thai Airways cancelled one of my flights a few months ago. The reason was it wasn't full enough. I had booked a direct flight, that was cancelled and I had no choice but to acceptance an indirect route with a several hour stopover.

[MJP]

Most of the decline is down to falling disposable income in the consumer countries.

I know hotel owners and restaurantuers who say low season is the new high season.

Primarily it's down to money.

[spidermike007]

BANGKOK: -- Experts with long experience in the tourism industry have outlined two major problems that have been holding back the sector for many years and need to be reformed for long-term competitiveness.

The first problem is that data and statistics provided by official bodies is inaccurate, and the second is that political power over the tourism sector is too centralised.

"These are the biggest problems for the Thai tourism industry and have been hurting the entire sector for decades. As a result, the industry is now facing the risk of collapse and losing its strength," one senior expert said.

These two big issues were raised in response to the appointment of a new tourism minister, Kobkarn Wattanavrangkul.

Members of this high-profile group claim 30-50 years of experience in the industry, some in the Tourism Authority of Thailand, as well as major hotel players and representatives of key travel firms and private-sector associations.

According to Apichart Sankary, former president of the Association of Thai Travel Agents (ATTA), certain authorities have forced organisations to provide unrealistic data, especially on international arrival numbers, or often provide only optimistic information to public.

He claimed that some information given out by officials was inaccurate. One mistake is counting one-day cross-border trippers as tourists. Moreover, arrivals are not categorised clearly, such as whether they are for business, leisure, long stays and so on, but are counted as one category, "tourist".

Finally we got an honest answer to that question. We have been asking for years, if the tourist arrival numbers included visa runners, and business visas. It would be so easy to separate the business visas from the tourist visas, with these numbers. If they wanted to. Apparently they do not. So, now we know for certain, that these numbers are a complete falsehood, and when measured side by side with other nations, who do not have an abhorrence for the truth, they cannot be taken seriously, and the data should be discounted as fiction. Good on Apichart Sankary, former president of the Association of Thai Travel Agents (ATTA), for speaking out, and being straight with us. He is a courageous man, and should be praised for his straight talk. The TAT, and the tourism ministry lacks all credibility, and is an ethically bankrupt ministry.

[AnotherOneAmerican]

Reasons not to come,

Junta, Scams, Rape, Murder, Racism, over development, corrupt police, gang control of all Islands, double pricing, higher prices, foreigners having less money.

In no particular order.

Did I miss any out?

Edited September 21, 2014 by AnotherOneAmerican

[GAZZPA]

Reasons not to come,

Junta, Scams, Rape, Murder, Racism, over development, corrupt police, gang control of all Islands, double pricing, higher prices, foreigners having less money.

In no particular order.

Did I miss any out?

Yes, I think you did miss 1 or 2.

One of the worst road safety records in the world.

Health and safety in every sense is almost non existent.

There are others but overall between us I think its a pretty comprehensive list..

[Franky Bear]

Have to admit after living here 10 years i still love the place. Never been knowingly scammed (i've no doubt i've been over charged a whole 20 baht for a check bin) I know the faults, i know the areas you can get scammed (once in a blue moon) so my eyes are open if i am involved. Anyone asks me to buy Gems i tell them a polite no thanks as that is not something i am into. I don't like beaches anyway so that doesn't really come into play, if i am on a beach i don't use Jetskies as i am not qualified to drive one and could harm myself or worse, someone else (they should be banned, period)

I've yet to be in a situation where a "No Thanks" didn't work, i might have to say it twice on the odd occasion, i still sleep at night after that terrifying second "no thank you", luckily.

I think a lot of the bitter people on here should pack up and leave or not come back, Thailand doesn't fit into your life choice, these message is loud and clear.

I've no doubt it'll be pointed out to me that i'm wrong for loving Thailand and what it offers me by someone and my assertions in my post are "wrong". For that, i apologise and wait to be educated and turned into a bitter and twisted Troglodyte

Edited September 22, 2014 by Franky Bear

[PaullyW]

Just from pure and simple observation over the last 5 years alone, the visible number of tourists has dropped MASSIVELY. High season this year most hotels were operating at 30%.

Towns like Hua Hin are still virtually deserted.

Pattaya is seeing a decline in Russian tourists - but perhaps for other reasons - but this still adds to the overall depletion of numbers.

The recent southern island murder mystery is going to have a massive impact on a global perception of Thailand, alongside the fact that the country is still under military rule.

To the uneducated overseas tourist - Thailand is an increasingly less attractive destination.

Not even the wondrous Thai punani can overcome that I'm afraid.

I agree with everything you've said right up to the punani point. Let's not get ahead of ourselves! The verdict isn't out yet on the punani. In my estimation is has been the main driver for decades through all kinds of tourism related issues. It's some powerful stuff for sure.

[PaullyW]

Have to admit after living here 10 years i still love the place. Never been knowingly scammed (i've no doubt i've been over charged a whole 20 baht for a check bin) I know the faults, i know the areas you can get scammed (once in a blue moon) so my eyes are open if i am involved. Anyone asks me to buy Gems i tell them a polite no thanks as that is not something i am into. I don't like beaches anyway so that doesn't really come into play, if i am on a beach i don't use Jetskies as i am not qualified to drive one and could harm myself or worse, someone else (they should be banned, period)

I've yet to be in a situation where a "No Thanks" didn't work, i might have to say it twice on the odd occasion, i still sleep at night after that terrifying second "no thank you", luckily.

I think a lot of the bitter people on here should pack up and leave or not come back, Thailand doesn't fit into your life choice, these message is loud and clear.

I've no doubt it'll be pointed out to me that i'm wrong for loving Thailand and what it offers me by someone and my assertions in my post are "wrong". For that, i apologise and wait to be educated and turned into a bitter and twisted Troglodyte

Com'mon Franky Bear. Do you expect a tourist who has never been here to somehow have gained your 10 years of wisdom perhaps during their flight to LOS? Don't be silly Mr. Bear. These articles, by the way, on the major issues in tourism, are written by THAIS. So, perhaps, just perhaps, there is some truth to the negative realities that many of us perceive. I have been here longer than you have, and I too am quite happy overall here, but my opinion of the tourism industry here is more in line with the negative opinions expressed.