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Pattaya’s hotels are taking their restaurants to the streets by offering food stalls outside and delivery in a bid to save their businesses during the Covid-19pandemic. Such changes in their attempts to avoid closing, come as city officials say they will use funds to spruce up the city for Chinese New Years on February 12.

As Chonburi province is still declared as a “high-risk” and “highly-controlled” area, all hopes of domestic and foreign tourism have been dashed as visitors are essentially banned. Even with recent virus infections down to just 1 over the past 3 days and single digits in the last week, the strict measures have not been lifted.

After Covid hit, hotels in Pattaya relied more on domestic tourists, which appeared to be working for several months after the city held more outdoor festivals to increase tourism traffic. Now, without domestic tourists helping to curb the financial downfall, the hotel industry has met many times with province leaders and represetatives from the Social Security Office of Thailand to ask for a forced legal closure which would allow their formal staff to get paid through social security benefits at roughly 50% of their daily wages.

The requests so far have been denied, leaving 30,000 hotel workers in Pattaya alone out of a job. Some hotels have managed to keep their employees and even providing meals and lodging for them. But smaller hotels have run out of money and are having to lay off staff without pay.

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Pattaya City is planning to clean up its Walking Street act in time for the upcoming Chinese New Year. But, as the second wave of Covid-19 mostly destroyed what was left of any foreign or domestic tourism, it might all be in vain. Thousands of businesses remain closed due to Chon Buri province being a “highly controlled” Covid-19 zone, which effectively controls the number of people moving in and out of the province, including Pattaya.

In other words, not many.

Banglamung has had 0 cases of Covid-19 for almost a week now with only 1 case being reported in Chon Buri in the past 3 days. But the new downturn in Covid infections hasn’t helped to ease restrictions that have left many local businesses shuttered. Chon Buri health officials are taking note of the recently diminishing amount of Covid cases and say they will review the strict measures probably at the end of the month, but warn that there is no promise that measures will be eased.

Even if the restrictions are lifted, Covid has had a profound and lasting effect on tourism in Pattaya, like the rest of Thailand. Last March, borders closed to foreign tourism, only allowing those who were able to physically and financially get through the mandatory 14 day quarantine and mountains of paperwork.

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The Koh Larn community committee is asking the Chon Buri provincial communicable disease committee to consider reopening the island after being affected by the restriction measures from January 5. Actually, almost closed down.

One of the Covid-19 hot spots, Chonburi is classified as a “high risk” area where maximum restrictions are imposed. Businesses and tourist destinations are ordered to close when infections consistently increase in the province. Koh Larn, the province’s popular tourists’ destination off the coast of Pattaya, is also affected by the restrictions.

The Koh Larn community committee says all stringent control measures are in place now, so there wouldn’t be a problem if they get back to operation again. They also revealed that each venue has the rights to do its business. However, accommodations must seek approval from the committee to make sure that they have well-managed measures. They also say most accommodations on the island are not ready to open and reopening may take some times to bounce back.

SOURCE: NNT

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