Thailand Plans to Reel in 10 Million Chinese Tourists in 2016

Thailand predicts 10 million tourists will visit their destination this year. The Chinese love for Thailand continues and 2016 is expected to be a positive year for Thai tourism welcoming Chinese tourists.

Chinese tourists in Thailand have been increasing year by year. 7.9 million Chinese tourists arrived in the Thailand in 2015 over 71 percent in 2014.

The deputy governor at the Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT), Srisuda Wannapinyosak, said that expectations for visitor numbers were high on the back of a very successful first quarter which saw a high volume of tourists arrive from China, reports the NNT.

Chinese visitors have been a huge boost to the Thai tourism economy in recent years – despite some isolated incidents leaving a somewhat sour taste in the mouths of some – and they now account for around 30 percent of total foreign tourist arrivals to the Kingdom.

They tend to arrive either as part of a larger tour group or as solo individuals and families. The latter are often categorised as ‘quality’ tourists, tending to spend somewhere in the vicinity of ?5,000 per person per day, and it’s this demographic the TAT are hoping to attract more of.

In order to tempt them in to Siamese shores, the TAT have come up with some creative marketing campaigns to pique the Chinese interest.

And so was yesterday launched the 2016 People’s Choice Awards Thailand Voted By Chinese Tourists. The less-than-pithy title is a very accurate descriptor of the poll: Chinese tourists will be asked to rate and review various Thai attractions via the popular Sino messaging apps, Wechat and QQ, according to Shanghai Daily.

There are 17 categories in which to vote, including food, attractions, airlines and hotels, and the whole campaign is aimed at collating feedback from Chinese visitors about their favorite things in Thailand.