Floods damage domestic travel

Tourism Council of Thailand says prolonged floods in the central and lower northern provinces since late July is now taking a serious toll on both domestic and international tourism throughout the country.

TCT planning and policy president, Kongkrit Hiranyakit, said domestic tourism a key player in sustaining SME companies and hospitality ventures throughout the countrydropped by 20% to 30% to around 70,000 trips a day from 250,000 a day during normal times.

“Domestic tourism will suffer losses of Bt10 billion if Bangkok if the provinces in the central region remain flooded throughout November.”

The only winners are beach resorts in areas that are easily accessible from Bangkok such as Pattaya and Hua Hin, but if floods close in on western districts then it is possible roads to Hua Hin could be flooded and cut off tourism to the popular resort, 150 km southwest of the capital.

Hua Hin does not have an operational airport, which limits access to road and rail transport. At the moment road and rail links are open.

Solar Air hopes to begin a daily service to Hua Hin, but due to  floods at Don Mueang airport, it postponed the inauguration together with all other  services scheduled from the north Bangkok airport.

Families made homeless by the flood have moved to the seaside resort towns of Hua Hin and Pattaya filling up hotel rooms and even renting houses around the resorts.

On average domestic tourism has a daily turnover of 250,000 trips with a daily spend per person of Bt4,600 to Bt4,700.

International tourism is already down with advance bookings washing out in November at around 30%.

It is too early to say if tourists will convert their Bangkok stays into holidays at the beaches or northern destinations, but that should be the recommendation offered by travel agents.

Floods are advancing through Bangkok and statements to the contrary that suggest Bangkok is open for business and the situation is normal are inaccurate and driven by commercial considerations rather than  serving the best interests of travellers.

Earlier, TCT initially estimated that foreign arrivals in the fourth quarter would reach 5 million trips.

“The number was likely to drop by 20% or between 700,000 to 1 million visits representing a Bt20 to Bt30 billion in losses based on average spending of Bt28,000 to Bt40,000 per trip,” he said.

At the moment 21 countries have issued warnings on travel to Thailand, but it would have been more accurate  to restrict the warnings to travel to the capital covering a period up  to 10 November.

The strongest warnings are from Hong Kong and Macau, both member countries of the Pacific Asia Travel Association that claims to have an advocacy role to ensure travel advisories are fair and accurate.

However, it has no influence over its member countries that sit on the board alongside representatives from Thailand. Its advocacy role should start within its own membership before addressing the travel advisories of nations that are not within its membership sphere.

Despite the setbacks, tourist arrivals could reach 18.86 million visits generating over Bt700 billion in tourism revenue, up 20.28% from 15.68 million arrivals earning Bt600 billion in 2010.

TCT calculates tourism revenue based on the Ministry of Tourism and Sports’ estimates for length of stay and daily spending, which in turn are derived from field surveys using teams of students who interview tourists usually at the airport. The surveys are supposed to be conducted annually.

Source - ttrweekly