Thai Immigration, the Ministry of Tourism and Sports, the Tourism Authority of Thailand, and now the Tourism Council of Thailand all seem to sing off the same sheet of tourism arrival numbers – the bogus numbers song.

There is an article today in The Nation, Full-year target on track as foreign tourists return, that has Pornthip Hirunkate, vice president for marketing at the Tourism Council of Thailand (TCT), spouting out the same old bullshit number that the Tourism Authority of Thailand Governor preaches.

Tourism Authority of Thailand Tuk Tuk

The entire article is make-believe.  Just like the numbers that come out every month from the Tourism Authority of Thailand.

Visitors are flocking back to Thailand, with growth of 26.5 per cent to more than 10 million in the first seven months, making the full-year forecast of 18.3 million look like a cinch.

Growth as compared to when?  Last year?  Of course there is growth – there are not any riots in Bangkok like there were last year for two months.

It wasn’t that long ago that the Governor of the Tourism Authority of Thailand predicted 16.5 million tourists this year and then changed that downward after the earthquake in Japan and some other world events to 15.5 million.

A month or so later, the Tourism Authority of Thailand Governor upped his prediction to 18.3-18.6 million.  Sheer fabrication of numbers.  MasterCard reported that Thailand had 10 million visitors in 2010 and would be around 11 million in 2011.

Pornthip Hirunkate, vice president for marketing at the Tourism Council of Thailand (TCT), said yesterday that international arrivals in the first six months were up 28.1 per cent to 9.6 million.

I tried to go to the Official Thai Tourism Government web site to look at the official monthly tourism arrival spreadsheets, but found that the site was down.  So, I went to the Ministry of Tourism and Sports site which has info also, and found that their links have been taken down.  Someone afraid of displaying the monthly statistics or just a computer glitch?  Will have to wait and check later on in the week.

Hotels in Phuket and Samui are running up to 90 per cent full this week. Both world-famous resort destinations are enjoying greater popularity from the high-end markets of China and Russia. Australians and Russians are also returning to other southern beaches.

This cannot be true.  It is LOW season.  It is rainy season.  It is NOT 90% capacity season.  And, from what I have seen in local newspapers online, the Russians are from the low end – the drunks that like to have sex on the beach.  Lots of arrests.

“We’re also seeing higher tourist numbers from the Middle East, especially in July. This is due to the unrest in Malaysia,” she said.

She is an idiot.  There is no unrest in Malaysia and tourist numbers are DOWN from the Middle East.  Maybe she hasn’t seen the riots in Syria, Egypt, Libya, Iran, and a couple of wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.  Oh, and Malaysia is NOT in the Middle East.

Thailand remains a gateway to the region, but the average length of stay has shortened by one or two days, particularly by tourists from Europe and the Americas. The TCT predicts 18.8 million to 19 million tourists this year generating Bt700 billion in income, climbing to 19.5 million visitors and Bt760 billion revenues next year.

Yes, Thailand is a gateway, and it looks like every individual that passes through the country gets counted as a tourist.  We are now up to 19 million tourists from the original 16.5 million predicted at the beginning of the year.  Won’t be long and the predicted number for 2012 will be 20 million tourist arrivals.

TCT president Piyaman Tejapaibun said the council would propose seven measures for the government to help develop tourism. They include building new products in key tourist cities, developing human resources, improving tourist accessibility and preparing the whole country to cope with the opening of the Asean Economic Community.

Virtually nothing has been done in Thailand to prepare for the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) that is only 3 1/2 years away.  This is a joint effort amongst the 10 ASEAN countries to work together and allow freer trade and commerce across the borders.  But since Thailand doesn’t play well with others, and has pissed off ASEAN a few times this year, I can see Thailand trying to play catch-up and failing miserably losing money to Singapore, Cambodia, Taiwan, Laos, Vietnam and the rest of the group.  Lots of tourists will go elsewhere and lots of jobs will be lost to those who are better prepared and speak English and/or Chinese.

The new government will be asked to focus on the tourism industry and use it as the key engine to drive the economy.

Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra has much more important things to do than worry about tourism.  She has to make arrangements to give her older brother, fugitive from Thai law, Thaksin Shinawatra, amnesty.

Tourism has been strangled for more than three years by the domestic chaos. The industry would expand faster if there were no more instability.

Tourism is still strangled thanks to the Tourism Authority of Thailand and their lack of ability to promote to foreigners.

The government will be urged to draft a five-year plan to lead the private sector, Piyaman said.

The Thai Government tourism folks rarely talk to the private tourism sector.  Nothing will change that.

The government aims for 30 million tourists and annual revenue of Bt2.6 trillion within four years.

First, Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra, in her 2020 plan, said a doubling of tourists to 30 million by the year 2020 (In reality it will be a tripling).  The Pheu Thai Party said they would have tourism doubled within 5 years.  Now it is four years.  Might as well just predict it for 2012, since no one checks the numbers that the Ministry of Tourism and Sports and the Tourism Authority of Thailand put out.

You can go and visit the Tourism Council of Thailand’s web site and see how “foreigner friendly” they are.  The menu across the top of the page is in English, and everything else on the site is in the Thai language.  Thanks.

It just goes to show that the Tourism Council of Thailand and the Tourism Authority of Thailand don’t really want farangs to visit Thailand or they would make their web sites more “farang friendly”.

Tags: thaksin tourism authority of thailand tourism council of thailand tourist arrivals yingluck