More than five million travellers have passed through Thailand’s arrival turnstiles during the first nine months of 2022, up to September 8.
Thanakorn Wangboonkongchana, a former government spokesperson, says that a total of 5,018,172 foreigners had travelled to the Kingdom. The Tourism Authority of Thailand had earlier estimated that the number of “tourists” would reach 10 million, according to their predictions, advance flight bookings and hotel bookings over the next three months.
Actual tourists only account for less than 60% of the total arrivals into Thailand.
According to TAT stats, the top four arrivals were from…
• Malaysia – 751,397
• India – 480,825 people
• Lao PDR – 310,464 people
• Cambodia – 249,084 people
Foreign arrivals at Thai airports…
• Suvarnabhumi International Airport – 2,772,883
• Phuket International Airport – 749,567
Arrivals into Thailand, particularly from Malaysia, Cambodia and Laos also reflect a lot of local trade, day trips and cross-border traffic, not necessarily “tourists”. As only 3.4 million, out of the five million travellers, arrived by air during the first 9 months, 1.3 million were coming into Thailand across its many land borders. Many Malaysians cross over the southern Thai borders for weekends.
