Unlike several European countries launching travel bans on Russia, Thailand is welcoming tourists from the previous Soviet state with open arms this winter. The Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) unveiled plans this week to fly Russian tourists into Thailand via regular chartered flights to spice up tourism revenue this High Season, which runs from November to February.
In the years leading up to the pandemic, the Russian market generated a major chunk of Thailand’s tourism revenue, Russians turned the second largest international supply market for Phuket’s tourism industry.
Even with the mounds of paperwork, money, quarantine and insurance involved in holidaying to Thailand when the borders crept back open in the course of the pandemic, Russians have been the primary to download Test & Go/Thailand Pass and hop on a airplane to Thailand.
However, since Russian President Vladimir Putin launched an assault on Ukraine in February, a quantity of airways have suspended their Thailand – Russia companies, and Russia’s access to the dominion waned. Some providers are nonetheless running, but tickets have surged 4 to 5 times pre-conflict prices, making travelling to Thailand an unrealistic option for many Russians. Russians nonetheless wish to come to Thailand, but they’re much less related.
Currently, Russians are banned from travelling to Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, and Poland. Lithuania’s interior minister this week stated that Russian tourists aren’t welcome because three-quarters of Russian citizens help the country’s invasion of Ukraine, a battle which has killed at least 5,827 Ukrainian residents.
But Thailand desperately needs to boost tourism income, with airline connectivity between Thailand and the relaxation of the world at solely 50% of 2019 figures, according to the TAT.
The TAT hopes that Russians will return to spend their rubles in the kingdom as soon as more if connectivity between Russia and Thailand is improved. Therefore, the TAT is working with tour businesses to fly Russian tourists into Thailand on chartered flights 3 times per week this High Season.
Additionally, Guaranteed will relaunch day by day direct flights between Russia and Phuket on October 30, 2022.
SOURCE: TrueID | Bangkok Post