BANGKOK – Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin stated on November 22 that the cancellation of flights from multiple Chinese cities to Suvarnabhumi Airport was due to insufficient demand, emphasising that it does not impact the visa exemption policy for Chinese tourists.
“It is not a complete cancellation. If there is a free visa policy, there could be an increase in bookings. However, China’s domestic policy supports domestic tourism and the country’s economic situation is not as good as expected. So although we expected a significant increase in Chinese tourists, this has not materialized. If we had not had this policy, it would have been even worse” he said.
The PM mentioned that during a meeting with Booking.com‘s executives, the parent company of Agoda, they confirmed that Chinese tourists were making transactions roughly three times more than before. The government has focused on the length of stay and spending per person, considering the increased travel expenses after the COVID-19 situation.
Chairman of the Executive Board of Thai Airways International Public Company Limited, Piyasvasti Amranand, pointed that economic slowdown within China and the emphasis on promoting domestic tourism by the Chinese government contribute to the lower-than-expected number of Chinese tourists visiting Thailand, despite the government’s free visa policy for Chinese tourists.
As a result, he said that the airline is considering reallocating aircraft to routes with higher demand, such as those to Perth, Australia, Oslo, Norway, and increasing flight frequency to Japan.
“Thai Airways had prepared our capacity for the Chinese market at 60 percent of the 2019 level. So far, we have only reached 40 percent and have not been able to increase the frequency and route as expected,” said Piyasvasti.
Thai Airways currently operates flights on five routes to China, including Kunming, Guangzhou, Chengdu, Xiamen, and Beijing. However, the frequency has not returned to pre-COVID levels.
Kerati Kijmanawat, CEO of Airports of Thailand (AOT), explained that the recovery of China-Thailand flights is about 60 percent compared to 2019, before the pandemic. This phenomenon is not unique to Thailand. Other countries are also facing the challenge of resuming normal air traffic with China, with the recovery rate only around 50 percent of pre-pandemic levels.
Thapanee Kiatphaibool, Governor of the Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT), acknowledged that the current influx of Chinese tourists is around 10,000 per day, with an expected increase to about 15,000 per day by the end of the year. TAT is considering proposing an extension of the free visa policy until the end of 2024.
According to tourism economic data from the Ministry of Tourism and Sports, there was a significant increase in the number of Chinese tourists in Thailand during the Golden Week from 1 to 7 October, which rose from an average of 10,000 to 17,000-18,000 per day.
In the past, an average of around 30,000 Chinese tourists came to Thailand every day. Currently, however, these are mainly independent travelers, not tour groups. It is expected that the number of them will gradually increase in 2024.
TAT has set a target of 4–4.4 million Chinese visitors visiting Thailand in 2023 to drive the income of the Chinese tourist market to the target of 257,500 million baht. However, the number of Chinese tourists who visited Thailand in 2023 from January 1 to November 19 was 2,975,155, the second highest after Malaysia which had 3,908,345.
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