Was doing some research last night about the Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) and found an article from the Bangkok Post discussing the TAT 2011 fiscal year budget.
Tourism Authority of Thailand Logo
The budget numbers may surprise you.
Total budget for FY 2011 for TAT is 5.24 BILLION baht – that is 5,240,000,000 baht. That’s a lot of baht!
At 30 Thai baht to $1 US Dollar that is $174,666,666 bucks.
Here is the breakdown of where the money will be spent:
Locally – 1.37 billion baht
Overseas – 2.92 billion baht
Other – 940 million baht
Having worked for the US Government and worked with large budgets, I know how to read between the lines a bit when explaining where the money will be spent.
Internationally, money will go towards “building Thailand’s image” (550M baht), “expanding the tourist base”(500M baht), and “focusing on ‘quality tourists’” (330M baht). Another 531M baht (Article says 531 baht) to “increasing competitiveness on the international stage”. The remainder goes to running overseas offices.
So far, I have seen one Thai advertisement running on the BBC rehashing the “Amazing Thailand” slogan from a few years ago. Not sure how this will build Thailand’s image, expand the tourist base, or bring in quality tourists.
Here is how the money will be spent locally:
“It will spend 280 million baht promoting travel as part of life. It will spend 230 million promoting trans-regional tourism, 220 million promoting local uniqueness, 80 million on tourist awareness, and 40 million on promoting learning during trips.”
So, almost anything that TAT does, can fit into one of these generic categories. I have yet to see anything TAT sponsored on Thai television in the ten months that I have lived here.
And, 40 million baht for field trips! Absolutely ridiculous. These are not trips to learn, they are boondoggles for everyone in the office to get out and have a fun-filled day.
Now TAT, has kinda-sorta joined the modern technology world with a new phone application and a Facebook page. The problem is that the app is for Thailand so it serves only the local populace and the Facebook page is used to post stupid items like “Today is Friday. What will you do for your weekend”.
Most TAT Facebook posts tell of events that are already completed or will happen later on that day. Very few events are given advance notice. Questions are only answered once in a great while and a lot of the answers are totally incorrect (dates, times, locations of events).
The way I see it, TAT has 3 markets to go after:
Overseas
Local Thais
Local Foreigners
And, from my perspective, they only really go after the Local Thai market. Most of their Facebook posts and emails are in Thai only and when asked for a translation, they whine because they are understaffed and don’t have time to post in English. However, the TAT office has sent out emails promoting a commercial travel agent and now my email address is being sent mail direct from that commercial travel company (hmmm wonder how they got my email address). Despite having requested 4 times to be removed from their list, I continue to get their promotions.
I have never seen anything geared at foreigners that live in Thailand – and there are quite a few of us. If anything, they market to our spouses in Thai and little, if any, info gets to us.
I would think that a pre-requisite to work in a TAT office would be that staff has to be bilingual. If they managed Facebook properly, one person for maybe one hour per day, could handle it all. It isn’t that difficult to look at a calendar and send out event notices on Facebook and answer a question or two. No, they would rather dress up a stupid little doll and make stupid comments about it.
`sukjai doll
Promotions locally seem to focus on the major parts of Thailand – Bangkok, Pattaya, Phuket – areas that really don’t need promoting since most people already know about them and what goes on.
But, when it comes time for an event in Northeastern Thailand, like the Khon Kaen International Marathon, no notice, no promotion, no questions answered, no photos or videos afterward. It seems like TAT doesn’t want visitors, local or foreign, to come to Isaan.
What I would like to see is where the money is actually spent. I would like to see the books. Surely, they have to provide expense and budget reports to someone. Would make for some interesting reading.
Oh well, it doesn’t really matter. Every satang of the budget will be spent. Tourism will decline but numbers reported will show an increase. Additional funds will be requested and approved for 2012 and more lies will be splashed across the English newspapers.
I can recall when I lived in Hawaii and the Hawaii Visitors Bureau budget was $5 million dollars and Hawaii attracted 5 million visitors – it cost about $1 in advertising to get one tourist. Thailand’s budget is about 10 times that.
Wonder where all the baht goes?
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