It has been two months since the last of coronavirus was discovered in Wuhan, China, and at that time people were worried because of a virus and then panic, but now it is not so much about that but actually all countries are facing this problem and everyone around the world is very concerned. In addition to that, there were also many reasons to be worried because of coronavirus but some of them were economic. For example, after lock downs or restrictions in many countries, tourist destination destinations have suffered. Many countries began to close their borders in an attempt to stop COVID-19. As a result tourism has suffered and there seems to be no end yet for this problem. This article will provide you with details of how Thai tourism became affected by Coronavirus through the whole tourism industry.

Thai Tourism Industry

First, let’s see what happened when coronavirus was discovered in Wuhan, China on November 13, 2019. According to WHO (World Health Organization), “Wujiang Seafood Market reported as having seen increases in seafood consumption by over 60%. This can be attributed to lockdown measures. The market in Wujiang Province, Zhejiang Province, where most seafood traders were located, experienced a sharp increase, likely due to social distancing, reduced demand as well as price hikes by government entities”. Now, these numbers didn’t tell us more than what we expect from our eyes, but according to other research it shows that the Chinese economy had taken a huge hit by COVID-19. So we may say that Thai tourism industry also fell into the same situation when the COVID-19 spread was reported in China. Another good point to say is they closed down all tourist attractions which means Thailand could no longer cater more tourists who love Thailand’s beaches.

From March 22nd to July 29th, Thailand recorded total daily arrivals of 632,084 with the majority coming from South East Asia and Europe. There are approximately 70,000 hotels which employ 20,000 employees. The country’s hotels closed or restricted to less than 10% occupancy in mid July due to Covid-19 and later opened their doors up again with capacity restriction as restrictions remained on. It is difficult for countries such as Thailand to accommodate even 25% population because of their vast sizes. As a result, Thailand was forced to lay off 20,000 workers while closing down 15,000 hotels. As a result the Thai tourism industry became crippled.

Now what happens then?

To add insult to injury, despite Thailand being home to 700 islands and having 7.3 million vacationers as visitors each year, Thailand alone generates only 2.9 billion U.S. dollars (Kerzner, 2020) from cruise tourism alone. With the country seeing a 3% drop in tourism, which means 8,000 jobs would be lost per month. Even though one might think that in the event of 100 cases of covid-19, we would just call that bad luck, we must also note that Thailand was experiencing a severe outbreak of COVID-19 earlier before its economy became crippled. Based off data by Worldometer.com (2020), the city of San Francisco alone lost $2,898 billion to preventable losses of $1.3 trillion in tourism revenue combined.

With many industries becoming effected on the economic front the Thai tourism industry is among the worst hit. If that isn’t enough, another factor affects tourism that is transportation. When traveling to travel regions you need to take in consideration weather conditions. You can get stranded in the rain for days if not weeks and end up having to wait for your flight back home. This is exactly why Thailand is experiencing the impact of corona by airfares. And when those flights come back you need to travel by bus, taxi or train. Because of this, the Thailand tourism industry is under extreme stress which can only decrease with time. To make matters worse, a recent study found out that Thailand will lose nearly three times as many foreign tourists as local travelers to the country during the period between February and March in 2021, according to Euromonitor International.

Coronavirus Impact On Thailand’s Traveling Business

With the travel industry suffering throughout the region, Thailand’s tourism business was impacted negatively. But for the positive side, the Thai holiday tourism industry grew 30% year-over-year in early January 2020 and then declined by 11% in early May. Travelers from outside Thailand also used the opportunity to experience Bangkok’s amazing scenery. However, during the pandemic, Bangkok has received tons of international tourists from Hong Kong and Taiwan. These types of travelers enjoy the Asian culture, the cuisine of the Asian continent and everything to do with Thailand’s traditional festivals. What happens with corona?

COVID-19 Pandemic Impact

COVID-19 began as a global epidemic. At first, it was only affecting China and Europe, but soon governments all around the world had to address it. A report released August 4, 2020 by ICMR (International Center for Mene Pneumonia Research) showed that the number of deaths directly related to covid-19 is growing rapidly in both developed and developing countries. Also, the death rate in US has risen from 2.5 to 4 people per day. Between April and July, the United States saw more than 23 million cases of the virus, which translates into roughly 1/7th of all known cases. In India, the mortality rate has increased rapidly from 0.91 per cent per day in June to four-quarters in December. The high rates of mortality are mainly caused by non-communicable diseases such as heart disease and cancer, as well as infections due to covid-19. In a further blow to the tourism sector, tourism operators like Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong and Taiwan reported higher levels of infection, hospitalization and mortality in places like Tokyo, Seoul, Manila and Jakarta, respectively. As COVID-19 started spreading throughout Asia, the hospitality industry experienced major setbacks and restrictions that resulted in massive job losses. Some companies even closed permanently. One hotel chain said: "It's going to be really tough for some businesses. Our company really tried to avoid the virus with the guidelines we had and had our staff go on shifts where they weren't allowed to work alone. I felt helpless."

As of September 11th, 2020, almost 200 countries have declared themselves free to travel to the United States, according to Department of State reports. As of October 17th, 2020, the United States had surpassed 2.3 million cases of covid-19 and about 180,000 Americans had died as a result. The CDC also indicated that 14.5% of individuals who contracted the virus had no co-morbidities and 5% of deaths were due to comorbidities. So in that sense, travel agencies saw the worst possible result of covid-19. From the beginning to the end of the year, travel agencies were losing millions in revenues. It is estimated that the entire tourism industry, including hotels, resorts and airlines, have already lost 40% of their annual income. Since early March, Thailand was the second largest source of tourism expenditure worldwide behind the USA. After the coronavirus outbreak, travel agencies across Asia reported a 300% decline in tourism arrivals.

Coronavirus Has Threatened A Major Part Of Thailand's Workforce

The tourism industry in Thailand has been particularly affected by the pandemic. Due to lack of tourists visiting Thailand, many jobs have disappeared. Thailand was listed as the third hardest hit country for unemployment rates worldwide. According to official statistics released by Statistics Canada, in 2016, there were 18.7% fewer people employed in Thailand compared to 2015. The lowest number of employed people was 4.2% in 1993. In 2011, a labor survey showed that Thailand ranked 12th as leading countries globally for low rates of unionization. Since covid19 outbreak, Thailand’s tourism industry has suffered in many ways including lower airfares, decreased tourism revenues, loss of tourism jobs and even tourism bans. Despite Thailand being considered as highly efficient in terms of tourism, it was still the worst hit country among others due to the fact that the Philippines had a similar outbreak. Since 1998, Thailand has been reporting 1,539,848 confirmed cases of covid-19. The figure has since increased in half a dozen countries including Japan, Canada, Mexico, Brazil and Australia. Since March, in Thailand it currently ranks 35rd in COVID-19 recovery with 9,639 active cases. By comparison, the world average is 9.5.