TAT Moscow wooing Russian tourists with over 3,000 winter charter flights

The Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) Moscow Office and 13 leading tour operators in Russia are planning to launch a range of winter promotions in September 2014 to promote Thailand’s many tourism attractions and attract high-end travellers from Russia during this coming winter season.

In a preliminary discussion, winter promotions would be promoted alongside an introduction of some 3,240 special charter flights from 35 cities in Russia and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), including Russia’s Moscow and Saint Petersburg, Ukraine’s Kiev, and Kazakhstan’s Almaty and Astana. The flights are set to bring holidaymakers to leading tourist cities in Thailand including Bangkok, Phuket and Krabi.

Mr. Thawatchai Arunyik, the Governor of TAT said, “We expect that these special winter charter flights and a range of exciting winter promotions that will be launched and promoted in September, will help to encourage travellers from Russia and countries in the CIS to make a trip to Thailand. Russia and CIS are one of the largest markets to Thailand.”

In the first seven months of 2014, the number of visitor arrivals from Russia totalled 1,028,231 travellers, representing a year-on-year increase of 6.54 per cent.  In 2013, Russia ranked third among the six Asia-Pacific countries that contributed more than one million visitor arrivals, with 1.74 million arrivals (a 32.66 per cent growth).

Five other markets are China at 4.6 million arrivals (a 66.40 per cent jump), Malaysia at 3.04 million tourists (up 19.05 per cent), Japan at 1.53 million tourists (an 11.84 per cent increase), South Korea at 1.29 million arrivals (up 11.32 per cent), and India at 1.05 million visitors (a 3.71 increase).

Mr. Thawatchai said, “For the entire 2014, TAT expects the number of visitor arrivals from Russia to total 1.91 million, or a 9.75 per cent increase over 2013.