In 2019, before the outbreak, the number of Thai tourists to South Korea hit a record high of 572,000, driven by K-Pop, Korean dramas and other South Korean cultures, making Thailand the ASEAN region’s top tourist destination. Recently, however, Thai tourists’ enthusiasm for South Korea seems to have cooled. Thai tourists appear to have been influenced by the social media hashtag“No travel to South Korea” and are now more likely to travel to China and Japan, A Nikkei Asia Review report said Monday, instead of going to Korea.
Thai tourists pose with the martial arts characters from Jin Yong’s novel The The Legend of the Condor Heroes in the ancient city of Xiangyang.
“No entry” label
“Last year, I was rejected by the Korean immigration authorities and immediately sent back to Bangkok,” Kirksowan, a 42-year-old housekeeper from northeastern Kalasin, told Nikkei Asia Review, “I don’t want to go to Korea any more. This is the most stressful trip I’ve ever taken. I have a very bad impression of Korea.”
On the 12th, college student Shia Shia told a global times correspondent in Thailand that in recent years, not only have Thais been denied visas to South Korea more frequently, but they have always been unable to obtain a reasonable and clear explanation for the refusal of visas, many Thais complain online.
Japanese media also mentioned that strict immigration checks in South Korea have even turned away some Thai tourists who have already obtained electronic pre-approval to arrive in South Korea. These Thai tourists can not take back their air tickets, hotels or travel advance payments, resulting in the loss of hundreds or even thousands of dollars. To make matters worse, South Korean customs officials have stamped their passports with a refusal-of-entry stamp, making it more difficult for them to enter other countries. South Korea blames illegal workers from Thailand for the problem.
In the last quarter of last year, the hashtag“No South Korea” began to spread on social media site X, sparking a wave of anti-korean sentiment, all of a sudden, there were millions of articles on Thai social media with the subject of“No travel to Korea”. “Boycott Korea” is a trending topic on Thai social media almost every month.
On July 30, South Korea’s tourism ministry announced that the number of tourists visiting Thailand fell 19.5 percent last month from 20,000 in the same period last year, the seventh consecutive month of decline.
“China’s tourist attractions”
In this situation, many Thai tourists have turned to China, Japan, especially China attracted a large number of Thai tourists. The most popular destination for Thais at the end of this year is China, according to survey data from well-known Travel companies NIDNOI Travel and Travelzeed.
In addition to having more attractions, Chinese tourists offer several non-tourist attractions — visa-free entry and cheaper options, said UTA, vice-president of the Thai outbound tourism association, and China’s“Excellent scenery and good atmosphere”.
Kandil, who works at the Thai Tourism Bureau and is mainly responsible for the Chinese market, told the Global Times’ Thai correspondent that the number of Thais visiting China has increased significantly this year, “Convenient visa-free policies, low-budget travel costs, and china-style entertainment are all advantages of traveling to China.”
The boss of Nidnoi said that although the economic situation has reduced the budget of Thais, the visa-free policy in China has given Thai tourists more choices. The TTAA estimates that 1.2 m people from Thailand will visit China this year, almost double the number in 2019, after China waived entry visas on March 1.
TTAA chairman Zainen said that China had become the most popular destination for Thais under the current circumstances, also because package tours can“Compete on price”.
Utachai said the four-day trip to China cost about 22,000 baht (4,460 yuan) per person, less than 30,000 baht per person for a similar trip to South Korea.
Thai Thaisiri travel agency staff told the global times that the cost of travel to China is much lower than to South Korea. More importantly, “There are so many wonderful natural landscapes and cultural and historical sites worth visiting in China, which are very attractive to Thai tourists.”
Mr. Tanabon, vice chairman of TTAA and managing director of Quality Express, said that China’s tourist destinations are diverse and safe. For example, Zhangjiajie-avatar location-changsha, Jiuzhaigou Valley-chengdu, Kunming-dali-lijiang and other travel package prices affordable, popular with Thai tourists. Thai tourists are The Korea Herald but their interest in Chinese travel is rising, the paper says. Now other Asian countries competing with South Korea for tourism are benefiting. “South Korea lost to Japan and now to China.”
Tide play IP out of the circle to attract tourists
Not only that, but the popularity of popular Chinese toys such as the Labubu, a bubble Matt Doll, in Thailand and the global popularity of bags by many Chinese designers have further boosted Thais’ enthusiasm for travelling to China.
In the Bangkok Suvarnabhumi Airport, Thais returning from Chinese trips always carry bags of toys and goods they bought from China, and actively display the “Fruits” of travel and write purchasing strategies online. Thais are also flooding into the domestic bubble Matt Live Studio, and even made a special trip to the domestic store, only to snap up Labubu. On China’s second-hand trading platform Xianyu, sellers receive orders from Thai buyers who communicate through translators, although sometimes the translation in the communication makes Chinese sellers feel like they are in between tears and laughter, but it does reflect the boom in Chinese fun and Chinese goods in Thailand.
The figures show that Thai Airways has increased the number of flights to China from seven to 11 a week, particularly between Beijing, Shanghai and Kunming in Yunnan Province, as demand continues to grow.
Zhang Lingyun, a tourism expert and professor at Beijing Union University, said in an interview with the Global Times on the 12th that cultural IP is playing an increasingly important role in promoting tourism and attracting tourists. China has always attracted a large number of tourists with its natural and human landscapes, such as mountains and rivers, historical sites and so on. Creating cultural IP can further tap the potential of China’s tourism, enhance the attractiveness of China’s tourism, further develop China’s tourism market space.
Zhang Lingyun believes that, “The inheritance of China’s 5,000-year-old civilization has never lacked cultural materials and has a large number of well-known figures. These are all treasures that we can refine into cultural symbols and build into cultural ips that are popular with tourists all over the world. These are our advantages, but also China’s tourism needs to develop direction. “We believe that a new force will emerge in promoting the development of the tourism market and boosting the consumer economy through cultural IP.”
However, Zhang also cautioned that cultural IP is often associated with social fashion and popular culture, to pay attention to continuous innovation. Therefore, in the cultural IP to attract tourists, especially overseas tourists, we should pay attention to explore the overseas tourists’ consumption psychology and the combination of Chinese culture.