"Fear & Possibilities in a World Post Coronavirus" That is the name of a new study that Blackbox Research, Dynata and Language Connect have jointly prepared. For 'fear' and 'possibilities,' as Thailand and Asia emerge from six months of fighting and containing Covid-19, with more knowledge and better handling of outbreaks, there are plenty of both.
The global study shows that Asian residents want to travel to Thailand when travel eventually opens up. The study looked at the feelings, preferences and expectations of just over 10,000 people in 17 countries.
Tourists from Hong Kong, Singapore, the Philippines, Indonesia and India prefer Thailand as their first destination when the borders of their own are reopened and they are able to travel again.
At this stage, Thailand is unlikely to reopen to commercial flights and leisure travel for the remainder of 2020 with comments from both Thailand's Tourism Authority and the country's Civil Aviation Authority confirming the situation in the past week.
Eighty-two per cent of Thais are confident that, when it does, "Thailand is well prepared to reopen its tourism and recreation activities."
But 90 per cent of Thais don't want tourists to come back until a Covid-19 vaccine or cure is available. That's indicative of the risk-averse Thai government and other surveys across the country showing Thais wanting at all costs to avoid a 2nd wave of the disease.
Based on travel industry figures, Thailand is likely to end 2020 with approximately 50 per cent of its inbound tour operators either bankrupt or unable to continue trading. Hotels and online booking services will not be much better off because they will increase the cash flow with loans and the country's GDP will shrink by 8.1 per cent
The economy of Thailand is heavily dependent on tourism, with foreign tourist dollars contributing to the national economy by around 11 per cent. If you add all the peripheral businesses that depend on the tourism flow, then the direct and indirect tourism contribution to the Thai GDP is close to 20 per cent.
• 93% of Thais acknowledge the importance of the tourism sector to the local economy.
• 22 per cent of Thais agree that tourism boards, including their own boards, are urgently needed for economic reasons to promote tourism.
• 91% of Thais wish to support local tourist attractions over the next 12 months
Saurabh Sardana, chief operating officer at Blackbox Research, says Thailand has the strongest domestic appeal among south-east Asian countries. The recent investment of 22.4 billion baht (around US$ 720 million) from the Thai government as a stimulus for domestic tourism, provides e-cash to local tourists in selected hotels and restaurants across the country.
"Our study found that the price for their next trip is not necessarily the highest priority – this applies to all key areas such as transportation, accommodation and attractions. Instead, visitor safety measures ranked the top of the list for most Thai travellers overwhelmingly ... 43 per cent transport, 46 per cent accommodation and 53 per cent attractions.
International leisure travel is not a high priority for most people across the survey, at least in the short term, with 44 per cent of respondents still keen to avoid international holidays. Of those, the Japanese (32%), Filipinos (42%), New Zealanders (43%) and Australians (52%) were the least interested in taking long-haul trips at this time.
Australia and Japan have been surveyed as the two other most popular destinations for Asian travellers, with Spain at the top of the European traveller’s list.
According to the survey, the countries whose tourism appeal took the greatest hit during the pandemic are China, Italy and the US.
• 80 per cent are prepared to pay for safer accommodation.
• 74 per cent are open to paying higher travel insurance premiums in exchange for viral outbreak protection.
• 76 % of respondents said their preferred destinations would be countries offering more 'contactless' experiences.
• 66% prefer to travel between towns or countries in their own vehicles, compared to travelling by plane.
Source Thaiger
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