February Thailand Tourism numbers released, down 44.3 percent

Bangkok-

The number of tourist arrivals in Thailand fell 44.3% in February from a year earlier, primarily due to the coronavirus epidemic, the Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) said on Monday this week.

Visitors from China, Thailand’s biggest source of tourists, tumbled 85.3%, TAT Governor Yuthasak Supasorn told a meeting of tourism operators.

In the worst-case scenario, the number of foreign tourists may fall to 30 million this year from last year’s 39.8 million, with spending down 22%.

Tourism is crucial to Thailand as spending by foreign visitors amounted to 1.93 trillion baht last year, or 11% of the gross domestic product (GDP).

To make matters worse, The Pattaya News adds, March and April are expected to be the worst hit times, especially April due to most official Songkran celebrations being cancelled, normally one of the largest tourism periods of the year.

Pattaya has not been hit as hard as Phuket or Koh Samui and still has a large contingent of Russian and Eastern European tourists coming.

Original source and more info:

https://www.bangkokpost.com/business/1874939/tourist-arrivals-plummet-44-3-in-february-due-to-coronavirus#cxrecs_s

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Adam Judd
Mr. Adam Judd is the Co-owner of TPN Media since December 2017. He is originally from Washington D.C., America, but has also lived in Dallas, Sarasota, and Portsmouth. His background is in retail sales, HR, and operations management, and has written about news and Thailand for many years. He has lived in Pattaya for over nine years as a full-time resident, is well known locally and been visiting the country as a regular visitor for over a decade. His full contact information, including office contact information, can be found on our Contact Us page below. Stories please e-mail Editor@ThePattayanews.com About Us: https://thepattayanews.com/about-us/ Contact Us: https://thepattayanews.com/contact-us/