TOURISM

Foreign arrivals approach 15 million so far this year

Thailand has welcomed nearly 15 million foreign visitors this year, generating over 700 billion baht in tourism revenue, according to Tourism and Sports Minister Sermsak Pongpanit. As of June 2, the total number of arrivals reached 14.95 million, contributing 709.34 billion baht to the economy.

Chinese travellers topped the number of foreign arrivals at 2.94 million people, followed by those from Malaysia (2.06 million), India (855,558), Russia (853,532) and South Korea (813,397).

Sermsak expects 590,000 foreign travellers to visit Thailand during the first week of June.

"I believe that Thailand's tourism will be more buzzing after this," he said.

He also expects 20.3 million travellers to visit the country during the rest of this year, which will help the ministry to achieve its target of attracting 35 million foreigners and generating 1.08 trillion baht in revenue from foreign arrivals in 2024.