By Dell Galen
Published Nov 20, 2023
Popular destinations in Asia include Japan and Thailand.
But as younger Chinese citizens become more wary about travelling abroad, both are losing popularity.
China Trading Desk conducted a quarterly survey of Chinese tourists to determine their travel preferences and found that both Thailand and Japan slid from the top rank earlier this year to the sixth and eighth positions, respectively. With Singapore moving to the forefront as one of the safest locations for tourists in 2023, the two countries are currently behind South Korea, Malaysia, and Australia as the next holiday choices for Chinese citizens.
Subramania Bhatt, CEO of China Trading Desk, claimed that Chinese people's attitudes on coming to Japan had been greatly impacted by the leakage of treated radioactive wastewater from the Fukushima nuclear power plant into the Pacific Ocean this summer. Fears among Chinese tourists have changed one of their most popular places into one of their least popular, according to Bhatt, despite assurances from the World Health Organization and other safety agencies that seafood from Japan is safe to consume.
Moreover, several summer blockbusters are discouraging Chinese visitors from visiting Thailand, an interesting spin on the "set-jetting" trend that has seen tourists flock to the sites where movies and TV series were filmed. While none of the two new Chinese films, "Lost in the Stars" or "No More Bets," is set in Thailand, critics have noted striking similarities between the films' fictitious narratives and actual occurrences that have made news in the country.
The United Nations estimates that hundreds of thousands of individuals in Southeast Asia fall victim to internet scamming every year, making "No More Bets" a particularly relevant and timely film.
Many compounds are located in Cambodia, Laos, and Myanmar, outside of Thailand's borders, in places with "little to no rule of law," as the UN puts it. According to the report, victims can be found all the way around the globe.
Since the Covid-19 outbreak, the issue has worsened, according to Pia Oberoi, senior adviser on migration and human rights in Asia and the Pacific for the United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner.
Scams aside, the regions are allegedly "lawless playgrounds" where smuggling of narcotics, animals, and even human beings is commonplace, in a billions of dollars business.
However, although reports of foreigners being picked up off the streets and taken into these institutions have been reported on Chinese social media, Oberoi said she hasn't seen any proof to support the claims. She noted that governments are making efforts to assist, but that more must be done to shake up systemic problems with corruption and rule of law enforcement in the area.
Reuters estimates that 11 million Chinese tourists visited Thailand in 2019, becoming China the country's top source market for international arrivals. According to the Ministry of Tourism and Sports of Thailand, less than 2.5 million Chinese nationals had travelled to Thailand as of the end of September. This number is far lower than the 5 million that Thai officials anticipated would arrive in the country this year.
A once-popular destination for international travellers, Southeast Asia has earned a poor reputation due to media portrayals of the region's rising crime rate and instability in recent years. According to China Trading Desk's Bhatt. some viewers of the movie have even voiced worries that coming to the area may harm their lives.
Although "No More Bets" has been outlawed in Cambodia, it has still earned about $500 million in China as of early September.
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