Thailand looks into Hokkaido's resolution to tourism crisis

BANGKOK, March 5 (TNA) - Hokkaido, Japan's second largest island but largest northernmost prefecture, has invited Thai business operators and journalists to look into its successful measures to restore the local tourism sector, after it was battered by tsunami in March 2011. Hokkaido's local administration recently led representatives of Thai tourism and export-import entrepreneurs, as well as journalists to learn on its tourism restoration plans, after the island was devastated by an earthquake and tsunami in 2011, resulting in an overall tourism crisis in Japan. A Thai-Japanese tourism coordinator, Rungnapa Kampaya, told journalists on Wednesday that, following the natural disasters, Japan switched its tourism promotional campaigns by focusing on outstanding tourism attractions in various unaffected areas, rather than those in affected areas, leading to the successful restoration of the Japanese tourism, including that in Hokkaido, where the number of international visitors is even now higher than that before the tsunami crisis. Rungnapa pointed out that the current domestic political turmoil has also affected the Thai tourism sector; so, it is an opportunity for parties concerned to learn on and apply the successful Japanese modeled measures for helping address a slowdown in the Thai tourism currently.(TNA)