The Thai government is working on a raft of fresh fiscal measures to sustain an economic recovery, foster new foreign investment and lower the near-record household debt, Thai Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra's top aide has said.
Vietnam received more than 8.8 million foreign tourist arrivals in the first half of 2024, surging nearly 60% year-on-year and rising 4% from the same period in 2019 – the time before the COVID-19 breakout. This more than attests to the recovery of the tourism sector, according to experts.
Ho Chi Minh City welcomed around 75,000 tourist arrivals over five days since the start of the Tet holiday (February 8) to February 12, or the third day of the first lunar month, up 15.4% year-on-year, according to the municipal Department of Tourism.
The number of tourists to the capital city of Hanoi hit 18.9 million in the first nine months of 2023, up 36.5% year-on-year, reported the municipal Department of Tourism.
The Government Office has recently released Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh’s conclusions at a conference promoting foreign tourist arrivals in Vietnam.
Vietnam saw 3.66 million foreign tourist arrivals last year, and those from the Republic of Korea (RoK) accounted for the largest proportion with over 965,000, or 26.4%.
Thailand held celebrations to welcome foreign visitors at seven airports and two immigration checkpoints on December 10 as it recorded 10 million foreign tourist arrivals for 2022.
Vietnam saw a year-on-year increase of 17% in exports in the first six months, but it will be hard for overseas shipments to meet expectations in the last half of the year, according to the HSBC.
Thailand recorded 3.12 million foreign tourist arrivals in the first seven months of 2022 as the country has removed most travel restrictions imposed earlier to curb the spread of COVID-19.
A conference was held in Cua Lo beach town, the central province of Nghe An, on December 25 to look into the tourism industry under the COVID-19 pandemic’s impact and discuss ways to promote this sector’s recovery and development in the time ahead.
The Bank of Thailand has slashed its economic growth forecast this year to 3 percent from 3.2 percent made in December, given the impact of the second wave of COVID-19 infections and tepid tourism.
Vietnam welcomed 17,736 foreign visitors in January, a month-on-month increase of 9 percent but down 99.1 percent year-on-year, the General Statistics Office announced on January 29.
Vietnam’s goods exports valued at 27.7 billion USD, up 0.2 percent from the previous month and 50.5 percent from the same period last year, according to the latest data unveiled by the General Statistics Office of Vietnam (GSO).
Indonesia recorded 160,280 foreign tourist arrivals in June, down 2.06 percent from the previous month and representing a drop of 88.82 percent as compared to the same month last year, according to the Central Statistics Agency (BPS).
The Ho Chi Minh City Department of Tourism on June 9 kicked off its annual tourism stimulus programme that will run throughout the year as part of its attempt to revive the hard-hit tourism industry.
The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in a gloomy picture being painted of Vietnam’s tourism industry in the first quarter of the year, as it triggered an 18.1 percent decline in foreign arrivals and made it particularly difficult for the country to achieve this year’s targets.
