Singapore, 18 October, 2019 – The Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) led a strong delegation of private and public participants to the ITB Asia 2019 at the Sands Expo and Convention Centre, Marina Bay Sands, Singapore from 16 to 18 October. This year marks the 12th staging of one of Asia’s leading annual travel trade shows with TAT participating each year.
The Thai Pavilion at the ITB Asia 2019 comprised 30 sellers. Of these, 26 were hotels and resorts and the rest consisted of tour operators and tourism-related agencies.
TAT Governor, Mr. Yuthasak Supasorn, said: “Our objective was to provide a platform for business discussions between Thai tourism operators and overseas partners on promoting tourism to Thailand, especially repeat visitors, and to reiterate and promote Thailand’s positive image to the world.”
He said TAT secured a pavilion space of 180 sq. m. with the delegation focusing on B2B tourism promotion and business appointments. This year the Thailand Pavilion was designed under the theme of ‘Tropical Modern Luxury’.
Tourism projects and services featured at the ITB Asia 2019 focused on community and local attractions that were also reflected in the pavilion’s design itself. Among them was the Hin Lat community (Ban Maphrao or Coconut Village) from Ko Samui, promoting the community as an attraction as well as its locally-made products. These include coconut oil, coconut body scrub, coconut lamps, coconut milk candy and coconut juice, which are part of the ‘All COCO’ brand that uses ingredients and materials from various communities in Samut Sakhon, Samut Songkhram, Nakhon Pathom and Ratchaburi.
Mr. Yuthasak said, “As well as annually participating in the ITB Asia, TAT is introducing the latest ‘Visa Singapore Cross Border’ activity under the ‘Fly Me to Thailand’ campaign to stimulate more travel during the end of the year.
Valid from 15 October to 31 December, 2019, the campaign offers Singapore travellers to Thailand privileges and discounts when travelling on Thai Airways International and Singapore Airlines plus a 500-Baht gift voucher for shopping at participating stores; such as, Central Department Store, Central Embassy, Siam Paragon, The Emporium and EmQuartier.
Singapore is the fourth largest tourist market to Thailand from Southeast Asia, after Malaysia, Lao PDR. and Vietnam. In 2019, during January – August, Thailand recorded 651,795 visitors from Singapore, generating 22.732 billion Baht in revenue. In 2018, there were 1,168,112 visitors from Singapore, generating 42.146 billion Baht in revenue. Free independent travellers (FITs) constituted about 90% of the overall visitors from Singapore.
