News: Crisis in Thailand causes decreased number of visitors, but the situation is improving

The political turmoil that is (was) going on in Thailand for several months now had an impact on the number of tourists traveling to this country. However, this number is not really dramatic and the only thing that was truly affected by this crisis is the projections made by the Tourism Authority of Thailand. This organization predicted a 10% growth of people who travel to Thailand in 2014 compared to 2013. Latest news on the other hand suggests that people working in the tourism industry should be happy if the number of tourists remains the same like the one in 2013.

The biggest decrease in the number of foreign tourists comes from the countries that have issued warnings for their citizens not to travel to Thailand to be careful when traveling to Thailand after the military coup took place in May this year – USA, Great Britain etc. Still, many European countries didn’t issue any warning for their citizens and this was probably the right thing to do because most of the tourist places in Thailand (except Bangkok) were peaceful during the turmoil, with no protests or clashes of any kind. In the beginning of the year the number of European travelers has decreased for only few percents. What is interesting is that in June 2014 the number of European tourists has increased compared to 2013. Another huge group of tourists that avoided Thailand in the past few months are the Chinese but with the latest measure from Thai officials (free visa for Chinese citizens) everyone is expecting an increased number of this valuable Asian guests. The news brought home from many foreign tourists that everything is normal in Thailand will also bring back the feeling of stability and reliability when we talk about Thailand.

On top of that, the provisional military-lead government is also aware that the tourism is one of the main sources of income for Thai economy. This is why they are planning some measures to boost the income from tourism. Thailand is definitely going to have a better future especially when it comes to tourism.

The number of tourists planning their vacation in Thailand increases

A lot of analysts predicted that this year could be the worst for Thai tourism but the truth is that this year may end to be as successful as last year (which was one of the most successful in Thailand’s history when it comes to tourism). The political crisis followed by the coup made by the Thai military didn’t stop the tourists to travel to this beautiful Asian country. In fact the number of tourists slightly decreased only during the days when the most intense events happened. But the fact that none of the groups that want to come to power in this country doesn’t have the intent to stop the progress of the tourist sector speaks a lot about the way foreign guests are treated there.

Thanks to the internet we can now compare and analyze data in the easiest way. According to one of the most popular websites for travel and tourism – TripAdvisor, the interest in traveling to Thailand has reached record high this year. Thai accommodation is one of the most searched terms on this internet portal. Of course this doesn’t mean that all the people who searched for Thai related properties will go there but it is a clear sign that people want to visit this country regardless of the fact that the political situation isn’t great. According to TripAdvisor, Thailand is a destination that is interesting for people from all corners of the world. What is interesting is that Brazilian travelers are the ones that are most interested for Thailand. United States, Egypt, Ukraine, Canada, Russia are some other countries on the list of countries with internet users that have shown interest in Thailand’s tourist offers.

Another good indicator about the profile of tourists interested in Thailand is the origin of the people posting reviews. In these terms, people from UK, Australia, France, United States and Thailand are the ones that have posted most of the reviews.

This is definitely a good  news for the Thai economy because it looks like that besides traditional foreign tourists there is interest among tourists from different countries too.