Thailand Shifts Tourism Strategy Toward High-Spending Visitors

Thailand is shifting its tourism strategy from maximizing visitor arrivals to attracting higher-spending travelers, Randy Thanthong-Knight reported for Bloomberg News.

Thailand is promoting luxury, wellness and medical tourism to increase visitor spending.

Rather than pursuing record tourist numbers, the government is targeting about 33 million foreign visitors this year, below the nearly 40 million who visited in 2019.

If arrivals fall below last year's 32.97 million, it would mark Thailand's first consecutive annual decline outside the pandemic period since at least 1995.

Tourism Authority of Thailand Deputy Governor Nithee Seeprae said:

"We're not too worried about the number of tourists because we want to generate more revenue from each visitor. We focus on quality markets."

He cited recent promotional events in Oxford and Manchester as part of the agency's strategy.

Thailand is targeting visitors interested in medical tourism, wellness retreats, concerts, festivals, golf, marathons and other sporting events because they tend to stay longer and spend more.

Visitors currently spend about US$1,500 per trip on average. Officials hope to increase that figure to around US$2,400, although tourism revenue is expected to rise only slightly this year—from 1.54 trillion baht in 2025 to 1.55 trillion baht.