CityNews – The Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT), Chiang Mai Office collaborated with the Tourism Authority of Thailand, Seoul Office and ASEAN Korea Center of South Korea announced the arrangement of an international camp “ASEAN Community Based Tourism Program 2018.” This camp occurs annually and this year, the ASEAN Korea Center of South Korea has taken charge and chose Mae Kampong Village Chiang Mai as the location for the event that will run from 3-8 January, 2018. The total number of participants will be 30 students, of which 15 participants are from South Korea and 15 participants are ASEAN students who study in Chiang Mai. All of the participants will be doing activities together throughout the 6 days and 5 nights in Chiang Mai.
TAT is honoured to have Mr. Prajuab Kanthiya, Chiang Mai Deputy Governor to be the president of the ceremony. The Deputy Governor stated that the objective is to encourage ASEAN youths to learn about community tourism, create identities, learn from experiences, and build friendship amongst their ASEAN peers. He added that the youth are an important human resource that will be important in the future. Furthermore, the Deputy Governor gave a speech telling the participants that it would be valuable to collect experiences and knowledge from the event, travel to important landmarks in Chiang Mai, and have the opportunity to meet and share ideas with the local people and as well as international participants during the 6 day event.
Mr. Santi Chudintra, Deputy of TAT East Asia Market Division stated that Thailand and South Korea have long had a close relationship with each other. To celebrate the 60th anniversary of diplomatic relations, TAT plans to arrange events to create greater bonds throughout 2018. One of these events is the ASEAN Community Based Tourism Program 2018.
Mr. Santi also stated that the ASEAN countries, including South Korea is highly important to Thailand’s tourism. According to statistics obtained in 2016, 32.59 million tourists visit Thailand, an 8.91% increase from 2015. Additionally, in 2017, there was 32 million tourists, a further increase of 7.39% from the previous year. 1.46 million of these tourists were from South Korea and 8.89 million were from other ASEAN countries. It is clear that the number of tourists from ASEAN countries is increasing every year.
This year TAT plans to focus more on promoting community tourism in Thailand due to the need for tourists to experience the genuine lifestyles, culture, customs, and communities of their neighbours. This is because each community has varying aspects that visitors find interesting, some that are outstanding despite hiding within simplicity. Mae Kampong Village Chiang Mai is the perfect place for this activity as it has beautiful natural surroundings that can be visited, and also interesting local lifestyles, culture, and customs. TAT strongly believes that this project will bring advantages to those who visit and will help improve sustainable tourism in the future.