Bangkok (VNA) – The Tourism Authority of Thailand(TAT) has envisioned three scenarios for the recovery pace of the country’stourism next year, with the worst case being a contraction of revenue frominternational visitors to 296 billion THB (about 9.5 billion USD).

Local media quoted TAT Governor YuthasakSupasorn as saying that the worst-case scenario, in which the country onlyallows international commercial flights to resume in the last quarter of 2021amid a prolonged pandemic and global economic downturn, will see Thailandwelcome just 6.14 million foreign tourists, mostly from Asia.

The worst-case scenario for the domestic marketis a nationwide lockdown that forces economic growth to plunge 8 percentyear-on-year, resulting in 68.4 million trips for the full year, generating 380billion THB.

If there is a partial lockdown and an economiccontraction of 3 percent, the number of domestic trips is estimated at 76.2million, contributing 458 billion THB to the country.

The base case is for tourism to start a recoverypath by the third quarter, with Thailand initially welcoming tourists fromshort-haul markets. At that time, tourists from Europe should gradually returnduring the summer break in July and August 2021, before fully rebounding by theend of the year.

Thailand will receive 12.5 million internationaltravellers and 618 billion THB in revenue in the base-case scenario.

If the country reports zero local infections,while GDP growth is at 5 percent and the consumer confidence index falls 3percent, there will be 84.92 million domestic trips with 491 billion THB inspending.

In the best-case scenario, total tourism revenuewill reach 1.52 trillion THB, with Thailand recovering at the fastest pace inthe second quarter.

Yuthasak said the agency estimates 20.5 milliontourists coming from Asia and Europe during the summer break, which willgenerate 977 billion THB. Local travellers will take 89.2 million trips with 548billion THB in spending if there are appropriate benefits to stimulate themarket.

In the first six months of 2020, the number offoreign visitors to this country stood at 6.69 million, a year-on-year declineof 66 percent. The TAT predicted that foreign arrivals this year may plunge to7 million, compared to the record of 39.8 million in 2019, if Thailand remainsclosed for international travellers in the fourth quarter of 2020./.