![]() ![]() “During the winter, European tourists want to escape the cold to Thailand,” said the country’s Finance Minister Arkhom Termpittayapaisith in October. But the country is firmly on the path to recovery, with tourism expected to hit 80% of pre-pandemic levels by next year, according to Burapachaisri.Įven with the global economic slowdown, Thailand isn’t too worried. It’s still lower than pre-pandemic levels Thailand saw nearly 40 million visitors in 2019. More than one million tourists arrived in September alone, said government spokesperson Anucha Burapachaisri - and the government is hoping to hit 10 million visitors for the full year. It re-launched the program early this year and has continued to ease restrictions in recent months.īy the fall, Thai officials were celebrating. Thailand began allowing fully vaccinated travelers last November, under a program that was briefly suspended during the spread of the Omicron variant. “Thanks to the explosion of domestic tourists after the Covid-19 epidemic, after half of the year the industry already obtained the targets set for the entire year.” “All indicators of the tourism industry have miraculously recovered,” said Nguyen Trung Khanh, director general of the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism, according to the government-owned news site VietnamNet. Vietnam saw 1.87 million international visitors in the first nine months of this year - 16 times higher than the same period in 2021, according to government statistics. In 2019, tourism had made up 12% of the country’s GDP, and authorities are eager to get back to those pre-pandemic levels. ![]() Vietnam began allowing foreign travelers to visit designated places under a vaccine passport program last November and fully reopened in March, three months earlier than originally planned. Some countries in Southeast Asia, whose economies rely heavily on tourism, got a head start on their East Asian counterparts by beginning to open up last year - and are already reaping the rewards. The country saw nearly 311,000 arrivals, of which more than half were tourists, in August - compared to just 97,000 arrivals during the same period last year, according to the Korean Statistical Information Service. South Korea lifted quarantine requirements for all international travelers, regardless of nationality and vaccination status, in June.Īnd it seems the bid has paid off. ![]() The highest spike came from South Korea, which saw a 194% increase in bookings to Japan - but similar increases were reported in European countries including Spain, Germany and the United Kingdom. The results were swift, with Singapore-based international travel service provider reporting a spike in bookings and searches for Japan that month. Tourists were slow to return, and, perhaps sensing the unpopularity of this approach, Japan relented in September, throwing open its doors to individual tourists with no daily limit on the number of entrants. Japan, one of Asia’s most popular tourism destinations, reopened with much fanfare in June 2022 - though it only allowed tourists to come in organized groups rather than as individuals. This came after the government reduced its mandatory quarantine from seven to three days for international arrivals beginning from June. The decision was celebrated by vacation-starved residents, business owners and government departments dependent on tourism.Īlso in September, the self-governing island of Taiwan further opened up by resuming visa free entry for visitors from places including the United States and the European Union. Hong Kong - a semi-autonomous Chinese city that has separate border policies than that of the mainland - ended what was once one of the world’s strictest quarantine arrangements in September. ![]()
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