International tourism 2022: 11.5 million foreign arrivals

The Tourism Authority of Thailand says that, now that they’ve blown past their 2022 target of 10 million international travellers, they are now predicting 11.5 million by the end of the year. This is 15% above their projections which seemed overly hopeful earlier in the year. From the beginning of the year through December 20, 10.9 million foreign tourists have arrived.

While this number is just over 25% of the international tourist arrivals before the Covid-19 pandemic, tourism revenue from domestic and international travellers is forecast to hit 1.5 trillion baht. That’s 50% of the total tourism revenue in 2019 before the pandemic.

The top international travellers have been from Malaysia, India, Laos, Cambodia, and Singapore, according to the Phuket News. But now Americans and Europeans are heading into Thailand at an increasing pace. The country eagerly awaits the reopening of China to allow that massive demographic to return to the kingdom. Minister of Tourism and Sports Pipat Ratchakitprakarn had originally based his prediction of 12 million visitors in 2022 banking on China reopening.

So far, Phuket has been the number one destination has tourism returns to Thailand. In the first 10 months of the year, Phuket tourism brought in 10 times the amount of revenue with two and a half times more international visitors than the second most popular destination, Pattaya.

December 16 set a new arrival record, with 13,448 people passing through immigration and passport control at Phuket International Airport on flights from abroad. Currently, the Phuket office at the Immigration Bureau reports that Russia, India, Singapore, Australia, in the UK are the top source countries for arrivals.

From November 1 through yesterday, a total of 475,654 international travellers entered Phuket, with the top 10 as follows:

• Russia: 130,016 travellers
• India: 53,934
• Singapore: 29,483
• Australia: 25,475
• UK: 25,390
• Kazakhstan: 19,515
• Germany: 19,473
• Malaysia: 18,025
• South Korea: 13,380
• USA: 12,467

The top 3 provinces for international arrivals: