Thai tourism expected to recover in second half of 2014

BANGKOK, February 21 (TNA) - The Tourism Council of Thailand (TCT) has assessed that the domestic tourism should recover in the second half of this year. TCT President Piyaman Tejapaibul made the assessment on Friday, saying she still hopes that domestic political problems should be settled peacefully then. Piyaman noted that she is working with the state-run Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) to launch campaigns to stimulate domestic tourism in the second half of this year, aimed to boost the number of international visitors to the Kingdom to 28-29 million and national tourism-related revenues to about 2 trillion baht throughout this year as earlier targeted. Piyaman asked commercial banks to lend financial support to small and medium-sized tour operators who are affected by negative impacts of Thailand's prolonged domestic political protesters. Piyaman pointed out that the number of international tourists, especially at hotels in the heart of Bangkok, has dropped due to the persistent domestic political protests, with the hotel occupancy rate falling to only 20-30 per cent. According to the TCT president, the negative impacts have also expanded to other tourist destinations, including Pattaya, Cha-am, Hua Hin and Kanchanaburi, which have consequently caused small and medium-sized tour operators to nearly run out of their liquidity and the TCT has, therefore, asked commercial banks to inject revolving funds into the troubled small and medium-sized operators. Meanwhile, the government of 48 countries remain their travel advisories about Thailand, most of them standing at levels 2 and 3, advising their citizens not to visit Bangkok, while Hong Kong's warning maintained at level 5, the most serious level, and Russia at level 4. Heavily affected areas include Bangkok and nearby tourist destinations, including Pattaya City in Thailand's eastern resort Chon Buri Province. Surapong Techaruvichit, President of the Thai Hotels Association, acknowledged that it remains impossible to estimate the damage of hotels, resulting from reduced room reservations, and he hoped that the domestic political protests would end soon, warning that prolonged domestic political demonstrations should lead to layoffs of workers.(TNA)