Mekong Subregion: Improving border facilities should become a must

KOH KONG/TRAT - Children, woman carrying heavy bags are running along a dusty road, barely paved while cars and motorcycles zigzag to avoid them; gaping officers barely seem to care about tourists passing in this chaotic place, dragging luggage in a cloud of dust from one country’s checkpoint to another. Welcome then to Koh Kong/Trat, a relatively busy cross-border checkpoint between Cambodia and Thailand along the new Southern Corridor envisioned by Mekong countries.

Unfortunately, this kind of experience is not unique to the place. Most of the travellers crossing a border between one of the Greater Mekong Sub-region will encounter this kind of experience. Even in the most ‘civilized’ ones –such as the border on the Friendship Bridge between Nong Khai (Thailand) and Vientiane- facilities would probably be qualified as ‘mediocre’ at best. For example, in Nong Khai/Vientiane, busses covering the small stretch between the two bridge’s ends are old, smelly and worst of it, steps to access inside are so high that older people or people with lots of luggage can not even climb inside. Busses are the only public transport allowed to carry visitors!

Ambitions of the Greater Mekong Sub-region with the support of the Asia Development Bank are to facilitate travellers’ movement and to develop multi-country circuits. Certainly an excellent initiative except that facilities do not cope with the dream. A situation which will only get worse as the ASEAN Economic Community is due to start by the end of 2015, further stimulating movements from one country to another as borders will at least disappear for ASEAN nationals. “We totally recognize that we have to work now on the hard and soft infrastructure of borders’ checkpoints. We already started by providing financing for the first new generation checkpoints such as between Vietnam and Laos. It will almost look like an airport terminal and should probably ready in a timeframe of two years, once approved”, says Steven Schipani, who looks at tourism development for the GMS at the Asia Development Bank.

Improving security at the border, providing facilities such as clean toilets, chairs to seat, covered walkways in case of rain, integrated ATM and currency exchange counters as well as clear signage are just some of the steps to be taken to provide a pleasant experience for travellers. Many tourists are often victims of scams around borders’ areas due to the lack of information and the messy aspect of immigration facilities.

“We are conscious that we must improve border checkpoints”, admits also Cambodia’s Minister of Tourism HE Dr. Thong Khong. “We already started to build up better border checkpoints to Vietnam and in Poipet at the Thai border. Koh Kong will be the next one as we plan to host the SEA Festival at Koh Kong in 2015”, promises the Minister. Laos and Myanmar also recently announced to open the first international border checkpoint. It should be ready after 2015, according to HE Professor Dr. Bosengkham Vongdara, Minister of Information, Culture and Tourism of Lao PDR.

As Mekong countries have the ambition of welcoming over 60 million of international visitors before the end of the decade, bringing borders facilities to world-class standards semm more than ever a priority.

Sourced: TravelDailyNews