Southeast Asian nations pledged on Monday to work together to help the region's tourism industry recover from last month's tsunami, and launch a marketing drive to woo tourists back.
After a day of talks on the Malaysian resort island of Langkawi, tourism ministers and senior officials from around the region said visitor numbers have fallen heavily since the Dec. 26 tsunami, even in countries that suffered little damage.
Thailand, hit hard by the disaster, estimates it will lose around 30 billion baht ($780 million) in tourist revenue this year and may not see a marked pick-up in arrival numbers until late 2005, Vice Minister for Tourism Krirk-Krai Jirapaet said.
"We (have to) see the ways we can cooperate to bring back confidence to recover the tourism industry in this region because it has dealt a very heavy blow...," Jirapaet told reporters.
He agreed with Malaysian and Indonesian ministers that it could take some time to draw tourists back after the horrific scenes carried on newspaper front pages and TV bulletins worldwide over the past four weeks.
It has been difficult to persuade tourists outside Asia that most of the region's tourist spots are open for business, the Thai vice-minister said, adding that it must have seemed to outsiders as if "the whole world has crumbled".
Ministers and officials of the 10-member Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) had yet to agree on a joint plan of action at the Langkawi talks, but delegates said a push to eliminate misconceptions about the true extent of the tsunami damage was likely to be among the steps to be taken.
CAMPAIGN TO LURE TOURISTS
Government representatives have asked an ASEAN marketing task force to prepare a regional campaign to lure tourists back, a senior Myanmar tourism official said, adding that ASEAN had about $100,000 sitting in a marketing fund.
Southeast Asian governments also wanted to encourage continued rapid growth in travel between their countries, given that locals should better understand the extent of the damage and their neighbors' plight, officials said.
"The ministers are confident that, in spite of the challenges posed to tourism, especially in the aftermath of the tsunami catastrophe, the ASEAN region continued to show its resilience and agreed to continue to maximize efforts to further cooperate to achieve greater growth," the ministers said in a draft joint statement obtained by Reuters.
Southeast Asia is estimated to earn $30 billion a year from tourism, more than other regions hit by the tsunami, one of the worst natural disasters in living memory, which killed more than 234,000 people around the Indian Ocean.
Indonesia, which took the brunt of the disaster, said it still expected tourist arrivals to grow 13 percent this year to around 6 million, as foreigners realized its major tourist destinations, such as Bali, had been nowhere near the danger.
"We are optimistic for 2005," Indonesian Tourism Minister Jero Wacik told reporters.
Some tourism officials said European visitors would travel to the tsunami-devastated areas anyway, registering a sympathy vote.
"When you look at the reaction in Europe, for instance, where I come from, many people feel they should go over there now to keep the tourism going," said Birger Backmann, senior adviser to the global body, the United Federation of Travel Agents.
"So there is a positive sense and I think that positive sense can be seen from the tremendous amount of money which has been collected. It was unheard of in history."
Asian travel agents are meeting separately in Langkawi this week and, like the ministers, are looking for ways to rekindle international tourism to minimize the damage to Chinese New Year holidays next month and the European summer from June. ($1 = 38.57 baht)
(Additional reporting by Jahabar Sadiq)
